Combat Skill Progression Revamped

[Clearsighted]

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This is exactly the type behavior that I hate in the game.  Treating the wilds like a training grounds instead of a place with real danger where anything could happen.  I hate hate HATE that the code rewards this type of behavior.

Eh, well.  In a skill-based RPI, everywhere is a training ground, and nowhere is.  If you can't invent plausible reasons to get into circumstances where you would become more skilled, then I guess your character shouldn't be skilled.

I kind of like the fact that you have to go out into the wilderness, because contrary to popular belief in this thread, it -is- vastly more dangerous than training in a stupid sparring hall.  There's no amount of witty banter and juvenile sex jokes that can thrill more than nearly getting steamrolled by a carru or having a tembo go all Terminator on your ass across the Known World.  For my 2 fucking amazing combat PCs, I have 81 dead ones that really weren't shit.

Everyone's claiming "roleplay" and "realism," but the fact of the matter is that the real driving force is folks want it to be easier to be a legitimate badass.  If you cared so much about roleplay, you wouldn't give a shit what your skill level said.

I don't think anyone would contest that sparring hall training is more dangerous. But clans that have sparring halls do often find themselves going into more dangerous situations than your average indie hunter. This isn't always the case, and I'm not a proponent of sparring becoming superior to real life or death situations.

But I think the best training should be life or death situations. And let's be real. It is more dangerous sparring than fighting the tiny handful of quick, weak critters that indie vets skill up on the most.

No one is skilling up on carru.

[Synthesis]

In Soviet Gol Krathu, carru skill up on you.

[Asanadas]

Synthesis, I believe you are so in-grained into the current process of combat skill acquisition that you are unable to see how it is legitimately flawed. The excuses you are making are logical fallacies and projection onto myself and the others in this thread in an attempt to invalidate our feedback.

Your opinion of what's "good" for the game is different from ours. Can you leave it at that, instead of insisting we are incompetent roleplayers compared to yourself?

[Synthesis]

I know exactly how it's flawed.  I know the arguments.  I really don't like the grind.  I think the alternatives are worse.  I think the stated arguments in favor of change are really based on frustrated desire to be badass, not on legitimately roleplay-detracting bugs.

[aeglaeca]

I don't think it's unreasonable to expect your skill sheet to reflect your 80 days played. I also don't think it's a frustrated desire to be badass if your PC can solo a bahamet into submission but can't get past jman weapon skill because of lack of stilt lizard hunting.

[Synthesis]

If you can solo a bahamet, why the fuck are you so concerned about "sucking?"

[aeglaeca]

I'm not particularly concerned about it, but I feel that the current system is very counterintuitive and completely understand the frustration of not seeing anything on your skill sheet tick after the initial month you spend playing the game. I think that seems to be the consensus overall.

[Clearsighted]

I think the stated arguments in favor of change are really based on frustrated desire to be badass, not on legitimately roleplay-detracting bugs.

That's hilarious, given I've taken advantage of the current situation to have extremely powerful combatty characters for years, while no one else knew what to do or get past journeyman, and I made the fricken thread.

[Synthesis]

Frustration doesn't necessarily equal failure.

[Clearsighted]

Frustration doesn't necessarily equal failure.

You've gone from making thoughtful points, to making completely illegitimate accusations, aimed not on the logic or validity of my posts or concerns, but aimed at me as a player, that I don't find it easy enough to get TEH BADASS.

That's so completely missing the mark, it's not even funny. It really lessens my respect for your input as well.

What's wrong with letting mundanes have a system that is intuitive, rather than counter-intuitive? So long as we're projecting unfounded accusations at each other, I could just as easily say that you're defending the status quo because it benefits those who have spent years of working the system and knowing where it is illogical.

The current system benefits me at the expense of other players. I dislike it, regardless of how it benefits me, because I'm tired of the same artificial methods over the last ten years. If you can't wrap your mind around that, then just stop trolling the thread.

[Synthesis]

I already stated that "improvement by failure" is intuitive.

I've offered at least 2? 3? different solutions for fixing the perceived problem.

I've also stated that I don't really care whether it gets fixed or not.

I'm sorry you're getting so butt-hurt about it, but really...almost nobody is going to pile on and say, "Yeah, I think the grind is alright.  Actually, I think it should be worse!"  There's not really a polite way to say, "I think you're just being a baby about it," which is more or less my opinion.

I have other reasons why I think the weapon skill grind should be hard as nails, but I'm not going to get into it, because it would just be speculating on perhaps non-obvious code-type things.

[BadSkeelz]

Wanting to roleplay a badass is still roleplaying. Trying to roleplay a badass in the southern Arm is annoying when you know the surest route to badassitude is riding north to combat the Verrin Hawk and Stilt Lizard menace. I'd wager that most people don't want to do that because its ridiculous, so we're forced to settle for the artificial plateau created by sparring halls and local wildlife that our characters have reasonable excuses to be fighting.

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This statement is also completely at odds with your stated desire for the wilderness to be dangerous and terrifying. If the wilderness is dangerous, wouldn't you WANT to not show any mercy to whatever's charged up on you? Every second you let Runner Amos wrestle that skeet is another second something much worse could surprise you all and ruin your days.

[BadSkeelz]

I don't think it's unreasonable to expect your skill sheet to reflect your 80 days played. I also don't think it's a frustrated desire to be badass if your PC can solo a bahamet into submission but can't get past jman weapon skill because of lack of stilt lizard hunting.

The one saving grace of a long-lived and active combat character* is that your hidden states of offense and defense are pretty damn high compared to most. We might not branch weapon skills (3/4s of which are kind of stupid anyway) but we can at least lay the hurt and defend reasonably well, even if we're nominally journeymen.

*Edit: That's played by someone who doesn't know the location of particular monsters or the length of the skill timer or the other coding quirks, which is most of us newbies.

[Clearsighted]

I already stated that "improvement by failure" is intuitive.

I've offered at least 2? 3? different solutions for fixing the perceived problem.

I've also stated that I don't really care whether it gets fixed or not.

I'm sorry you're getting so butt-hurt about it, but really...almost nobody is going to pile on and say, "Yeah, I think the grind is alright.  Actually, I think it should be worse!"  There's not really a polite way to say, "I think you're just being a baby about it," which is more or less my opinion.

I have other reasons why I think the weapon skill grind should be hard as nails, but I'm not going to get into it, because it would just be speculating on perhaps non-obvious code-type things.

If it makes you feel better to peddle some fantasy about the only reason people might have of disagreeing with the current system is that they can't be TEH BADASS like you, and aren't as hardcore as you, so be it. Sorry to prick your ego, but knowing the location of the two or three mobs in the game to get easy misses on, does not make you hardcore. Because that's how you're coming off right now.

Anyways. It's not particularly 'hard as nails' either. Any vet, if they really want to, can get to mastery in ~15 days played in perfect safety. The sad thing is that, those methods are the only way to reach mastery.

[Synthesis]

Wanting to roleplay a badass is still roleplaying. Trying to roleplay a badass in the southern Arm is annoying when you know the surest route to badassitude is riding north to combat the Verrin Hawk and Stilt Lizard menace. I'd wager that most people don't want to do that because its ridiculous, so we're forced to settle for the artificial plateau created by sparring halls and local wildlife that our characters have reasonable excuses to be fighting.

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This statement is also completely at odds with your stated desire for the wilderness to be dangerous and terrifying. If the wilderness is dangerous, wouldn't you WANT to not show any mercy to whatever's charged up on you? Every second you let Runner Amos wrestle that skeet is another second something much worse could surprise you all and ruin your days.

Everything is risk vs. benefit.

There are at least 2 things around 'nak you can get to mastery on, and they're super dangerous, too!  You don't even have to pretend.

[Clearsighted]

Wanting to roleplay a badass is still roleplaying. Trying to roleplay a badass in the southern Arm is annoying when you know the surest route to badassitude is riding north to combat the Verrin Hawk and Stilt Lizard menace. I'd wager that most people don't want to do that because its ridiculous, so we're forced to settle for the artificial plateau created by sparring halls and local wildlife that our characters have reasonable excuses to be fighting.

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This statement is also completely at odds with your stated desire for the wilderness to be dangerous and terrifying. If the wilderness is dangerous, wouldn't you WANT to not show any mercy to whatever's charged up on you? Every second you let Runner Amos wrestle that skeet is another second something much worse could surprise you all and ruin your days.

Everything is risk vs. benefit.

There are at least 2 things around 'nak you can get to mastery on, and they're super dangerous, too!  You don't even have to pretend.

Maybe while drunk and with a bag full of stones on you.

[Synthesis]

I already stated that "improvement by failure" is intuitive.

I've offered at least 2? 3? different solutions for fixing the perceived problem.

I've also stated that I don't really care whether it gets fixed or not.

I'm sorry you're getting so butt-hurt about it, but really...almost nobody is going to pile on and say, "Yeah, I think the grind is alright.  Actually, I think it should be worse!"  There's not really a polite way to say, "I think you're just being a baby about it," which is more or less my opinion.

I have other reasons why I think the weapon skill grind should be hard as nails, but I'm not going to get into it, because it would just be speculating on perhaps non-obvious code-type things.

If it makes you feel better to peddle some fantasy about the only reason people might have of disagreeing with the current system is that they can't be TEH BADASS like you, and aren't as hardcore as you, so be it. Sorry to prick your ego, but knowing the location of the two or three mobs in the game to get easy misses on, does not make you hardcore. Because that's how you're coming off right now.

Anyways. It's not particularly 'hard as nails' anyways. Any vet, if they really want to, can get to mastery in ~15 days played in perfect safety. The sad thing is that, those methods are the only way to reach mastery.

You're cherry-picking my one irrelevant aside, man.  Let it go.  Fine, you're a fucking saint who just loves purist RP so much that you can't stand the injustice of training.  I believe you.  Really, I do.

[Clearsighted]

I already stated that "improvement by failure" is intuitive.

I've offered at least 2? 3? different solutions for fixing the perceived problem.

I've also stated that I don't really care whether it gets fixed or not.

I'm sorry you're getting so butt-hurt about it, but really...almost nobody is going to pile on and say, "Yeah, I think the grind is alright.  Actually, I think it should be worse!"  There's not really a polite way to say, "I think you're just being a baby about it," which is more or less my opinion.

I have other reasons why I think the weapon skill grind should be hard as nails, but I'm not going to get into it, because it would just be speculating on perhaps non-obvious code-type things.

If it makes you feel better to peddle some fantasy about the only reason people might have of disagreeing with the current system is that they can't be TEH BADASS like you, and aren't as hardcore as you, so be it. Sorry to prick your ego, but knowing the location of the two or three mobs in the game to get easy misses on, does not make you hardcore. Because that's how you're coming off right now.

Anyways. It's not particularly 'hard as nails' anyways. Any vet, if they really want to, can get to mastery in ~15 days played in perfect safety. The sad thing is that, those methods are the only way to reach mastery.

You're cherry-picking my one irrelevant aside, man.  Let it go.  Fine, you're a fucking saint who just loves purist RP so much that you can't stand the injustice of training.  I believe you.  Really, I do.

Well, I'm glad we finally agree on something! Now where's my kudos?

[Synthesis]

Wanting to roleplay a badass is still roleplaying. Trying to roleplay a badass in the southern Arm is annoying when you know the surest route to badassitude is riding north to combat the Verrin Hawk and Stilt Lizard menace. I'd wager that most people don't want to do that because its ridiculous, so we're forced to settle for the artificial plateau created by sparring halls and local wildlife that our characters have reasonable excuses to be fighting.

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This statement is also completely at odds with your stated desire for the wilderness to be dangerous and terrifying. If the wilderness is dangerous, wouldn't you WANT to not show any mercy to whatever's charged up on you? Every second you let Runner Amos wrestle that skeet is another second something much worse could surprise you all and ruin your days.

Everything is risk vs. benefit.

There are at least 2 things around 'nak you can get to mastery on, and they're super dangerous, too!  You don't even have to pretend.

Maybe while drunk and with a bag full of stones on you.

Lol, okay.  I almost died at least a dozen times with my badass, some even after day 40.  Hell, one time even a scrab nailed me for 90% of my hp when I was trying to train up polearms.  X-D and Majikal (I presume) very nearly PK'ed me at least twice.  And I never did the drunken stones thing, because that's too lame even for me.

The fact that something is safe -most- of the time is meaningless when you gotta get out there every damn day to do work.

[Clearsighted]

Wanting to roleplay a badass is still roleplaying. Trying to roleplay a badass in the southern Arm is annoying when you know the surest route to badassitude is riding north to combat the Verrin Hawk and Stilt Lizard menace. I'd wager that most people don't want to do that because its ridiculous, so we're forced to settle for the artificial plateau created by sparring halls and local wildlife that our characters have reasonable excuses to be fighting.

You can get around these problems, by and large, if you have a leader in your clan who knows what the deal is, and lets people train appropriately.  E.g. instead of group-ganking that mob, let people take turns soloing it.  Great time to practice rescue, as well.  If someone's facerolling it, tell them to back off and let someone else have a go.  Have your defensive guy tank it and let the noobs play with the pinata.  Etc. etc.

This statement is also completely at odds with your stated desire for the wilderness to be dangerous and terrifying. If the wilderness is dangerous, wouldn't you WANT to not show any mercy to whatever's charged up on you? Every second you let Runner Amos wrestle that skeet is another second something much worse could surprise you all and ruin your days.

Everything is risk vs. benefit.

There are at least 2 things around 'nak you can get to mastery on, and they're super dangerous, too!  You don't even have to pretend.

Maybe while drunk and with a bag full of stones on you.

Lol, okay.  I almost died at least a dozen times with my badass, some even after day 40.  Hell, one time even a scrab nailed me for 90% of my hp when I was trying to train up polearms.  X-D and Majikal (I presume) very nearly PK'ed me at least twice.  And I never did the drunken stones thing, because that's too lame even for me.

The fact that something is safe -most- of the time is meaningless when you gotta get out there every damn day to do work.

We should all be forced to reach mastery by skilling up on X-D and Majikal.

[Jihelu]

Give me the ability to set custom attack emotes and make my self a JOJO character and the system is fine.

That is all that is needed.

On another note warrior grinding seems meh.

[valeria]

I'm on the "who cares" bandwagon.  Mostly because none of my combat PCs has lasted long enough for me to hit whatever ceiling you're all talking about.

[Aruven]

lol how is it the same people on the GDB are always pushing buttons and nobody ever catches on

[Eyeball]

I know exactly how it's flawed.  I know the arguments.  I really don't like the grind.  I think the alternatives are worse.  I think the stated arguments in favor of change are really based on frustrated desire to be badass, not on legitimately roleplay-detracting bugs.

If everyone should stay stuck at journeyman (which seems to be what you want), then why not change the skill cap to that and be done with it?

Oh, is it because certain people (like you?) have figured out tricks to progress beyond it, and don't want to lose the advantage?

Easy to sling accusations, isn't it.

[Armaddict]

...and yet again...why I liked the skills better when people -couldn't- see what level they were at.

As stated...you will improve when it is IC to do so.  Naturally.  Because you will be fighting things you need to improve to do well against.  If you're already doing well, you won't improve, because you're already playing the badass regardless of what your skills say.  Just because there are 'tricks' to getting better doesn't mean that people who have played the game for 10 years and entered numerous debates and gone through numerous changes to code enough times to know what the trick is doesn't mean they are using advantages.  I haven't had a PC get past apprentice weapon skills since you were able to see skill levels.  I don't think.

The objective is not for everyone to reach master.  The objective is not to find a safe way to train things up until every fight is safe.  Stop it.