Nosave Parry

[BadSkeelz]

This is an idea to address the "imbalance" of skill progression between combat PCs who train within military clans through sparring, and those who just hunt.

Some of you may have noticed something I've come to think of as the Sparring Plateau - where a warrior or other combat guild's defense and Parry Skill reach a height that they begin parrying most attacks, being struck by those that get through and rarely if ever dodging. This plateau can come quite early in a PC's life.

Some of you may also know that a Parried attack gives no skill-gain benefit to either the attacker or the defender. It isn't a failed attack, so the attacker's weapon skills and offense do not raise; nor is it a failed defense, so the defender's defense remains unchanged.

All together it can make warriors rather inefficient sparring partners after a certain point. They are hard to Miss and to Hit, retarding everyone's skill gains.

My proposal:
Nosave Parry
Your character will not attempt to parry attacks.

While your Parry is toggled off, you would not be able to raise the skill (i.e. sustained hits do not count as parry fails). I envision it being of most use to characters who have already maxed their Parry skill and wish to rein themselves in during spars. They can be trying to focus on their own footwork, or they can be encouraging their partner to improve their aim by either landing hits or sidestepping swings entirely. The OOC justification remains as meta as ever - to make Warriors more viable sparring partners, and allow them to continue to learn by participating in clan life.

[MeTekillot]

But going out to attack NPC wildlife with high agility is much better roleplay??? bad idea! no i'm just kidding, yes, good idea.

[Delirium]

I like it.

You can also use only one weapon, with the roleplayed reason being that you are focusing on honing your footwork and aim rather than going for powerful blows or sheer offense (i.e. adding your other hand, or another weapon). Combine that with nosave parry and warriors could spar pretty effectively with lower level PCs.

I also think people neglect the "teach" command way too much. Use it liberally whenever it makes sense, IMO.

[Asanadas]

Absolutely yes. Absolute and completely yes.

And edit: if it could be made so that warriors could 'opt-out' of the parry fail check and get their base defensive checks, that would be even better. But I think that's what you mean in less bannable meta-words.

[BadSkeelz]

You can also use only one weapon, with the roleplayed reason being that you are focusing on honing your footwork and aim rather than going for powerful blows or sheer offense (i.e. adding your other hand, or another weapon). Combine that with nosave parry and warriors could spar pretty effectively with lower level PCs.

I really like this suggestion and how it reinforces the notion that this is something for use in training.

And edit: if it could be made so that warriors could 'opt-out' of the parry fail check and get their base defensive checks, that would be even better. But I think that's what you mean in less bannable meta-words.

That is the idea. Having Nosave Parry On (so you don't try to parry, ever - still not 100% sure how to properly phrase nosave states after all these years) means you're relying solely on your base defense to avoid blows.

[wizturbo]

This is an excellent idea.  A simple, but very effective way to resolve a problem that's been lurking out there for ages.

It also has some roleplay value, for those who want to "take it easy" on their opponent, conceal their own fighting ability, or are "practicing their footwork" as another poster mentioned.   I like the anti-guild sniffing potential of this too.

I would say that changes like this might have an undesirable effect on relative skill levels throughout these combat clans though, which might require nerfs in the future to offset...  Be careful what you wish for when it comes to combat skill gain improvements. The only reason warriors are allowed to become as bad ass as they're able to become now is because it's very hard and time consuming to do.  Having characters that can solo entire waves of gith may seem fun now, but if there are 15 characters like that floating around, it's going to get ridiculous when staff have to dish out 10 raging mekillots at once in order to create a risky RPT environment.  Power creep is a dangerous thing.

[Armaddict]

Yup.  Good solution.

I'd like it even more if we went back to forced brief skills, though.  I will never get behind the idea of 'I should be able to get incredibly good with relative safety while I keep track of some arbitrary ooc knowledge of how good I am in comparison to everything, not just those I train with'.  Just because of the principle of the thing.  But this is a good idea to assist with certain training problems.

[Refugee]

Yes yes.

[Asmoth]

I've only had a few pcs that went through sparring regularly.

But I've had a shitload of warrior/hunters or ranger/anythings and can tell you without a doubt that sparring is SHIT compared to fighting critters/gith/stilt lizards.

My pcs that sparred all the time hit that parry issue fast but sucked d at fighting when it mattered.

[hopeandsorrow]

It's good idea, though I will miss goofy loose reasons we all invented to go get fails.

Change objective Knock out a lizard with my fist.
Change objective Chase a turaal.
Change Objective Capture a Jozhal and let run around my apartment trying to kill me while I lie down.

[lostinspace]

Seems like a relatively simple change that would make a lot of sense IC. As of now non-sparring warriors max out pretty quick on the defensive side of things and they don't have a very good way of getting better without doing wonky stuff like hopeandsorrow just brought up. It would add to realism while allowing an indie warrior to progress naturally. Also I've hit that plateau with a good wisdom warrior and waiting for the others you joined a clan with to catch up can be excruciating, especially when it takes more than a month.

[Delirium]

With as brutal as Armageddon combat can be, I'm not too worried about power creep. There's always a way to die.

[lostinspace]

With as brutal as Armageddon combat can be, I'm not too worried about power creep. There's always a way to die.

What's interesting is that I'd imagine this change would make the average PC considerably more capable if they took advantage of it and put them on a more even footing with those that currently game the system to get stronger, who don't really need this, but would probably enjoy it for RP/ease reasons.

[Asanadas]

What it would do would be give the clans characters an opportunity to become as bad as the guys who walk around outside trying to punch furry little creatures. And I wholeheartedly believe there is nothing that would stop a staff member from being able to kill a character.

Even if you were the buffest dude, you might still be killed from one throwing knife. 

[Desertman]

We could just do away with the concept that you only learn when you fail.

Why is that in place anyhow?

Why don't I also learn in combat when I do things correctly?

I get that you are, "Learning from your mistakes.". Fine.

But, I would also propose that we implement, "Learning through repetition, even if the repetition is the correct repetition.".

It would do away with the issue of "I can beat everyone in my clan by a huge margin now, so I can no longer learn, no matter how many times I show up and spar for the next 10 IC years.".

[Asmoth]

What it would do would be give the clans characters an opportunity to become as bad as the guys who walk around outside trying to punch furry little creatures. And I wholeheartedly believe there is nothing that would stop a staff member from being able to kill a character.

Even if you were the buffest dude, you might still be killed from one throwing knife. 

The only thing wrong with this statement is that hardly any of the creatures are furry...

[Delirium]

We could just do away with the concept that you only learn when you fail.

Why is that in place anyhow?

Why don't I also learn in combat when I do things correctly?

I get that you are, "Learning from your mistakes.". Fine.

But, I would also propose that we implement, "Learning through repetition, even if the repetition is the correct repetition.".

It would do away with the issue of "I can beat everyone in my clan by a huge margin now, so I can no longer learn, no matter how many times I show up and spar for the next 10 IC years.".

I completely agree. My thinking is that this is a nice stopgap between now and the much larger code change that "no more fail to learn" would entail.

[Rokal]

Dont forget shield block. It could possibly included in nosave parry - but i generally agree with this idea

.

We could just do away with the concept that you only learn when you fail.

Why is that in place anyhow?

Why don't I also learn in combat when I do things correctly?

I get that you are, "Learning from your mistakes.". Fine.

But, I would also propose that we implement, "Learning through repetition, even if the repetition is the correct repetition.".

It would do away with the issue of "I can beat everyone in my clan by a huge margin now, so I can no longer learn, no matter how many times I show up and spar for the next 10 IC years.".

Dman here pretty much sums up my thoughts.

there should be a chance a skill goes up on a success. Even if its only a partial increase compared to a fail.

[Asmoth]

Dont forget shield block. It could possibly included in nosave parry - but i generally agree with this idea

.

We could just do away with the concept that you only learn when you fail.

Why is that in place anyhow?

Why don't I also learn in combat when I do things correctly?

I get that you are, "Learning from your mistakes.". Fine.

But, I would also propose that we implement, "Learning through repetition, even if the repetition is the correct repetition.".

It would do away with the issue of "I can beat everyone in my clan by a huge margin now, so I can no longer learn, no matter how many times I show up and spar for the next 10 IC years.".

Dman here pretty much sums up my thoughts.

there should be a chance a skill goes up on a success. Even if its only a partial increase compared to a fail.

Go fight some mantis and step your sparring game up.  You'll miss.

[BadSkeelz]

There already is a nosave shield ability: it's called remove shield

I honestly thought about including it, but really, if you don't want to block with a shield, don't use one.

As for Dman's thoughts... I don't disagree that the system as it stands is wonky. However, there's something to be said for the "Learn by Failure" system. It makes it so you level up fastest when you don't know anything, while slowing your rate of advancement the deeper into a skill you go. Skill Gain Rate decreases the more skilled you become. That seems nicely organic to me.

If you learned on success, I think you'd see a lot of people floundering at the bottom of the pyramid as they repeatedly fail while a fortunate few are able to skyrocket to godlike levels, their successes building on each other in a runaway reaction.

The big problem with the Learn by Fail system we have is that for weapon and combat skills, it becomes unreasonably difficult to fail if you're behaving reasonably. More experienced PCs parrying all your attacks away (negating everyone's advancement) is a big reason for this.

[Synthesis]

Turning parry off wouldn't help anything.

If you're parrying, it means you're not good enough to dodge that attack in the first place.  From my observations, the combat code doesn't run a parry check until you fail the dodge check, and it doesn't run a block check until you fail both the dodge and the parry check.

Turning parry off wouldn't help the attacker train, because then they would just get a useless hit instead of a useless parry-fail.

Turning parry off wouldn't help the defender train, because there is no PC-attainable level of just parrying that will prevent you from being hit.  I.e., whatever is getting trained by being hit will always be trainable, assuming it is training anything at all.

The "solution" is for parries and blocks to count as failures for the weapon/style skills.  That's not going to happen, because it would instantly entirely remove the plateau for weapon/style skills, because parry (as I believe it's coded) is a pass-fail check, not a dice-roll vs. dice-roll check.  That is, anyone with the parry skill AT ALL would be able to generate failures for even the most advanced weapon skill.  Consequently, mastering weapon/style skills would be far too simple and common.

[BadSkeelz]

If you're parrying, it means you're not good enough to dodge that attack in the first place.  From my observations, the combat code doesn't run a parry check until you fail the dodge check, and it doesn't run a block check until you fail both the dodge and the parry check.

I believe you are correct in the order of checks. But for training purposes, I believe it is better to be hit than to parry, because at least that way the Defender's defense will go up, allowing them the chance to dodge future attacks (assuming they keep parry toggled off). Right now, successfully parrying negates skillgains in defense. This leads to two warriors parrying the shit out of each other, very slowly easing their defenses up whenever they land a hit while largely negating their offensive gains. Sparring thus becomes the second least efficient means of skill progression for warriors, leaving hardened soldiers to tremble before Timmy the Turaal Hunter.

The least efficient being the sparring dummy.

Turning parry off wouldn't help the attacker train, because then they would just get a useless hit instead of a useless parry-fail.

See above. It may not benefit the attacker at that moment, but it will allow for someone to progress in sparring. That someone can become a better opponent, eventually causing you to miss.

Turning parry off wouldn't help the defender train, because there is no PC-attainable level of just parrying that will prevent you from being hit.  I.e., whatever is getting trained by being hit will always be trainable, assuming it is training anything at all.

Again, better to be hit and take the damage (and defense gain) than parry and gain nothing.

The "solution" is for parries and blocks to count as failures for the weapon/style skills.  That's not going to happen, because it would instantly entirely remove the plateau for weapon/style skills, because parry (as I believe it's coded) is a pass-fail check, not a dice-roll vs. dice-roll check.  That is, anyone with the parry skill AT ALL would be able to generate failures for even the most advanced weapon skill.  Consequently, mastering weapon/style skills would be far too simple and common.

This is a fair point and worth consideration. Advanced weapon skills may need balancing and reworking if they actually became common in the game world.

[CodeMaster]

I remember the Byn had barehand training days where you got to train without weapons (and therefore parry).  I bet other sparring clans have something similar?

I like the idea of being able to turn a passive skill like parry off. 

[Armaddict]

Advanced weapon skills may need balancing and reworking if they actually became common in the game world.

Is there a reason for this?  I've asked before and gotten only vague answers.  Are these more powerful than normal weapon skills in some way?  Do they build on each other?  Are the weapons of those types just 'better' than other weapon types?

I had said if they were no different, then I didn't see why they were so hard to get.  But that if they were superior to the other ones, then they should remain hard to get.  I keep hearing inferences of both types.

[BadSkeelz]

Advanced weapon skills may need balancing and reworking if they actually became common in the game world.

Is there a reason for this?  I've asked before and gotten only vague answers.  Are these more powerful than normal weapon skills in some way?  Do they build on each other?  Are the weapons of those types just 'better' than other weapon types?

I had said if they were no different, then I didn't see why they were so hard to get.  But that if they were superior to the other ones, then they should remain hard to get.  I keep hearing inferences of both types.

I suspect it has to do with your Skill in a weapon also improving your defense against said weapon. Since few people have advanced weapons skills, they're at a disadvantage against them. That's just conjecture, though. If you're getting beat on by someone who actually managed to branch an advanced weapon, they could probably beat you with anything. I've only ever seen two wielded in three years by non-Templar PCs. Not much data to work with.

I remember the Byn had barehand training days where you got to train without weapons (and therefore parry).  I bet other sparring clans have something similar?

They do. It still makes raising weapon skills difficult because no one (to my knowledge) has "Beat on an unarmed man with weapons" day. Attack an armed warrior with high defense = parrying and no gains.

[MeTekillot]

New Byn Drill: Apartment Gank

Strip the runner down and throw them in the circle with someone with a dagger. They gotta get the dagger from the guy who is stabbing them. Helps raise weapon skills, defense, offense, and disarm

[BadSkeelz]

I actually ran that once in the AoD, but we gave up on it because we (Being me and another newb) didn't think an unarmed man could disarm someone. Certainly not at our skill levels.

[Synthesis]

Advanced weapon skills may need balancing and reworking if they actually became common in the game world.

Is there a reason for this?  I've asked before and gotten only vague answers.  Are these more powerful than normal weapon skills in some way?  Do they build on each other?  Are the weapons of those types just 'better' than other weapon types?

I had said if they were no different, then I didn't see why they were so hard to get.  But that if they were superior to the other ones, then they should remain hard to get.  I keep hearing inferences of both types.

I suspect it has to do with your Skill in a weapon also improving your defense against said weapon. Since few people have advanced weapons skills, they're at a disadvantage against them. That's just conjecture, though. If you're getting beat on by someone who actually managed to branch an advanced weapon, they could probably beat you with anything. I've only ever seen two wielded in three years by non-Templar PCs. Not much data to work with.

I remember the Byn had barehand training days where you got to train without weapons (and therefore parry).  I bet other sparring clans have something similar?

They do. It still makes raising weapon skills difficult because no one (to my knowledge) has "Beat on an unarmed man with weapons" day. Attack an armed warrior with high defense = parrying and no gains.

If an armed warrior is only parrying you, either your base offense + weapon skill is already very high, or he doesn't actually have high base defense.

Training armed vs. unarmed is useless almost always, because base offense + weapon skill is almost always greater than base defense (vs. humanoids), so you'll always get hit.  If someone is good enough to dodge you unarmed, they'll also dodge you just as much while armed (even more while etwo'ing).

[BadSkeelz]

If an armed warrior is only parrying you, either your base offense + weapon skill is already very high, or he doesn't actually have high base defense.

I think the problem is when your base offense + weapon skill is very high compared to your opponent's defense. This is the Plateau, where two PCs of not very high absolute skill are evenly matched enough that they cannot progress while fighting each other. And then of course there are the 90 day warriors who just parry everything thanks to master parry (Which may mean their actual absolute defense is surprisingly low, but I'm not sure on that), which prevents anyone from sparring them actually learning about weapons. Either way, you wind up with at least one PC who cannot raise their skills in training and thus find themselves outmatched in the field. Either their offense is too low they can't hit anything, their defense is low because they've parried away hits that would have raised it, or both.

Training armed vs. unarmed is useless almost always, because base offense + weapon skill is almost always greater than base defense (vs. humanoids), so you'll always get hit.  

If someone is good enough to dodge you unarmed, they'll also dodge you just as much while armed (even more while etwo'ing).

Ah, wouldn't they parry you (assuming they have the skill) since they now hold a weapon to parry with? That's been my experience. Edit: Though I see what you mean, Parry being the last check before armor for defense. It's just rare to run in to anyone who can actually dodge unarmed against an armed opponent.

Armed vs. unarmed is not a very good training method for several reasons, this I agree with.

[Inks]

Turning parry off wouldn't help anything. as much as you say.

If you're parrying, it means you're not good enough to dodge that attack in the first place.  From my observations, the combat code doesn't run a parry check until you fail the dodge check, and it doesn't run a block check until you fail both the dodge and the parry check.

Turning parry off wouldn't help the attacker train, because then they would just get a useless hit instead of a useless parry-fail.

Not entirely true. Dodge is 100% taken into account before parry, as Synthesis said. Nosave Parry would however help the defender's defense, which with time, would lead to more dodges from the warrior. Nosave Parry would also be extremely useful for preventing guild sniffing. So this would be a good change for two reasons.

[wizturbo]

Either way, you wind up with at least one PC who cannot raise their skills in training and thus find themselves outmatched in the field. Either their offense is too low they can't hit anything, their defense is low because they've parried away hits that would have raised it, or both.

Teach command is very powerful while skill levels are low.  If there's a character out there who cannot raise their skills because their opponents are too strong, teaching them will very quickly get them up to speed.  I've had characters get fairly decent skills without ever actually engaging in coded spars purely through the teach command...unless staff went in and mucked around with my combat skills while I wasn't looking, which is very doubtful.

[Asanadas]

If an armed warrior is only parrying you, either your base offense + weapon skill is already very high, or he doesn't actually have high base defense.

And he doesn't have high base defense, because ever since he branched parry, if he's fighting with a weapon that can parry then he isn't getting base defense fails.

Please no ban.

[RogueGunslinger]

Base defense fails are stupidly easy to get. It's really not like offense where you just stop missing.

[Inks]

^

[Asanadas]

Base defense fails are stupidly easy to get. It's really not like offense where you just stop missing.

Yes, they are stupidly easy to get. However, when I was playing my warrior, I had to come up with questionable reasons to actually get them.

Here, new recruit, let me fight you holding a towel in my off-hand while you have a shield and wooden sword.

I'm not saying they couldn't be gotten -- it's just like punching little creatures outside the walls, though. Acting with first-blush sense in an RPI is counter-intuitive to the legacy of code that we have.

[Malken]

Throwing myself into the tok's den a few times a day hoping for an army of toks to jump my kickass warrior so that he could finally fail his defense skill brings back fun memories.

[Nergal]

Some of you may also know that a Parried attack gives no skill-gain benefit to either the attacker or the defender. It isn't a failed attack, so the attacker's weapon skills and offense do not raise; nor is it a failed defense, so the defender's defense remains unchanged.

This statement isn't actually true. A successful parry is a success for the person being attacked and a failure for the person attacking, as one would logically expect.

[Desertman]

There already is a nosave shield ability: it's called remove shield

I honestly thought about including it, but really, if you don't want to block with a shield, don't use one.

As for Dman's thoughts... I don't disagree that the system as it stands is wonky. However, there's something to be said for the "Learn by Failure" system. It makes it so you level up fastest when you don't know anything, while slowing your rate of advancement the deeper into a skill you go. Skill Gain Rate decreases the more skilled you become. That seems nicely organic to me.

If you learned on success, I think you'd see a lot of people floundering at the bottom of the pyramid as they repeatedly fail while a fortunate few are able to skyrocket to godlike levels, their successes building on each other in a runaway reaction.

The big problem with the Learn by Fail system we have is that for weapon and combat skills, it becomes unreasonably difficult to fail if you're behaving reasonably. More experienced PCs parrying all your attacks away (negating everyone's advancement) is a big reason for this.

You are misunderstanding my idea, though I admit I didn't go into very much detail.

I STILL want the current system of learning when you fail at the EXACT SAME RATE it sits at now.

I just ALSO want you to learn when you succeed....just much more slowly....and not if you have recently "learned from a failure".

The argument being, "You learn more from your mistakes, fine, but you also learn some through just basic correct repetition.".

[Asanadas]

A successful parry is a success for the person being attacked and a failure for the person attacking, as one would logically expect.

Just so I'm crystal clear, a person's weapon skill goes up when they "fail" their attack because it was parried?

[Desertman]

A successful parry is a success for the person being attacked and a failure for the person attacking, as one would logically expect.

Just so I'm crystal clear, a person's weapon skill goes up when they "fail" their attack because it was parried?

Yes.

[RogueGunslinger]

Well that's interesting. Just sort of confirms what I learned earlier. Doesn't matter if you are failing, they still go up slow as fuck.

[Asmoth]

I'm super surprised that this much code discussion is being tolerated. On my previous account I got banned for weeks sometimes for discussing mechanics.

Not that I give a shit about what you guys are doing because I've always thought you should be able to know how the game works.

I'm just pleasantly surprised they are finally letting up on that.

[Desertman]

I'm super surprised that this much code discussion is being tolerated. On my previous account I got banned for weeks sometimes for discussing mechanics.

Not that I give a shit about what you guys are doing because I've always thought you should be able to know how the game works.

I'm just pleasantly surprised they are finally letting up on that.

It has been common knowledge that you learn from failing for as long as I've played this game. I remember this actually being stated on the website somewhere around 15 years ago.

If someone parries your attack, of course you have failed to hit them.

I think they are allowing this to take place, because that is just basic common sense in my opinion.

All they are confirming is, "Well, yeah...if you don't hit them, you don't hit them. How is this a question?".

*shrug*

[Delirium]

Experience really does not back this up, but hopefully it is true, as it definitely makes more sense.

The combat code just works in strange ways sometimes, so it's easy to decide that it considers a parry a would-be success when you don't seem to learn by fighting PCs you can't "full miss".

I had a combat PC that plateaued hard and after 30 days played was still stuck at the same skill level, and only ever sparred someone who she couldn't miss any more, but would "parry" her blows.

I had a combat PC, same class, with admittedly better wisdom, that mastered the same exact skill in 10 days played because, I assumed, they primarily hunted instead of sparring.

Both PCs had decent wisdom, even if the second one had better wisdom, and in the first case, the skill went from novice to advanced very quickly, and then just lingered at advanced for the rest of the time I played her, during which time I rarely sparred anyone that I could actually "full miss" on. So to me, that seemed to confirm parried blows are not nearly as valuable, if at all.

Either way, I'd still like to see nosave parry for other training and roleplay related reasons. It'd be a solid way to add choices to mundane combat.

[Synthesis]

Experience 100% does not back that up, unless a parry-fail gives a much, much, much smaller skillgain than a dodge-fail.

[BadSkeelz]

Some of you may also know that a Parried attack gives no skill-gain benefit to either the attacker or the defender. It isn't a failed attack, so the attacker's weapon skills and offense do not raise; nor is it a failed defense, so the defender's defense remains unchanged.

This statement isn't actually true. A successful parry is a success for the person being attacked and a failure for the person attacking, as one would logically expect.

Experience 100% does not back that up, unless a parry-fail gives a much, much, much smaller skillgain than a dodge-fail.

My reaction is the same as Synthesis'. I wonder if it's some sort of bias on our part or if the values are indeed different.

All the same, thank you for the information Nergal.

[Nergal]

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

[RogueGunslinger]

I'm gobbling up this code knowledge like its juicy, delicious steak.

[Synthesis]

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

All that is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't change the UNDENIABLE FACT that sparring "quick" critters will jack your weapon and style skills up faster than anything else.  So much faster that, even if parry-fails do "technically" count, they practically do not, over any reasonable period of time.

[BadSkeelz]

I don't think we can really speculate on why that might be, Synthesis. I mean, we could, but it may get the thread locked.

Anyone able to think of any downsides to PCs being able to forgo the Parry save and just take the hit? The one that comes to mind is that it could let sparring PCs raise their defense up perhaps unreasonably fast as they suffer more fails.

[Asmoth]

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

All that is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't change the UNDENIABLE FACT that sparring "quick" critters will jack your weapon and style skills up faster than anything else.  So much faster that, even if parry-fails do "technically" count, they practically do not, over any reasonable period of time.

There are plenty of those quick critters out there to fight.

If people are really all that concerned about the plateau, by the time you hit that plateau you're most likely pretty boss skills wise and probably clan/organization wise.

Find a reason to go smack the shit outta a stilt lizard.

[Nergal]

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

All that is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't change the UNDENIABLE FACT that sparring "quick" critters will jack your weapon and style skills up faster than anything else.  So much faster that, even if parry-fails do "technically" count, they practically do not, over any reasonable period of time.

I don't see how my statement is irrelevant. Obvious to some, perhaps, but not irrelevant. Of course, you are pointing out the obvious as well - it's understood in probability that if there is a chance of an outcome happening in a given trial, then the event is more likely to happen within a larger set of trials. Note that that isn't an endorsement of the "spar quick critters" method of training, but rather me saying that you can fail a thousand times against an animal or a clan-mate and still achieve (roughly) similar skill gains over (roughly) the same period of time, long-term.

That's all I have to say about that. I don't personally see anything wrong with the initial idea in the OP, I just sought to point something out that wasn't factual in the post in order to help guide discussion toward the merits of the idea itself without regard to what impact it might have on skill gains.

[Synthesis]

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

All that is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't change the UNDENIABLE FACT that sparring "quick" critters will jack your weapon and style skills up faster than anything else.  So much faster that, even if parry-fails do "technically" count, they practically do not, over any reasonable period of time.

There are plenty of those quick critters out there to fight.

If people are really all that concerned about the plateau, by the time you hit that plateau you're most likely pretty boss skills wise and probably clan/organization wise.

Find a reason to go smack the shit outta a stilt lizard.

Schools of thought on this:

1.  Only a few people deserve to be amazing fighters.  Only sparring stilt lizards seems to produce amazing fighters.  Only a few people will grind out stilt lizards to become amazing.  Ergo, the system is producing the desired result.

2.  Only people who perform legitimate roleplay tasks deserve to be amazing fighters.  99/100 times, sparring stilt lizards is not a legitimate roleplay task.  Ergo the system is producing exactly the opposite of the desired result.

I'm not going to really elaborate further than this, but it suffices to point out the text in 'help faq_9': When you fail in an attempt to use a skill or spell, there is a chance it will improve.

Failure does not always lead to skill gain every single time. There are a number of factors, and due to the nature of the skill list that players see, gains are hard to measure. Often you would be more successful paying attention to the actual results of combat over time than what it says next to your skill.

All that is completely irrelevant, because it doesn't change the UNDENIABLE FACT that sparring "quick" critters will jack your weapon and style skills up faster than anything else.  So much faster that, even if parry-fails do "technically" count, they practically do not, over any reasonable period of time.

Note that that isn't an endorsement of the "spar quick critters" method of training, but rather me saying that you can fail a thousand times against an animal or a clan-mate and still achieve (roughly) similar skill gains over (roughly) the same period of time, long-term.

I don't care whether you have access to the code or not...this statement is completely at odds with the experience of anyone who has attempted to skill up a warrior, ranger, or assassin the legit way.

We are telling you:  the code is not working the way you think it works.  We know this, because we grind it out character after character after character after character, and only the characters who hunt  tarantulas, stilt lizards, and the gangly elf ever get anywhere beyond journeyman.

[Asmoth]

... and the gangly elf ever get anywhere beyond journeyman.

This made me laugh my ass off.  I didn't know he was so widely known.

[Nergal]

I don't care whether you have access to the code or not...this statement is completely at odds with the experience of anyone who has attempted to skill up a warrior, ranger, or assassin the legit way.

We are telling you:  the code is not working the way you think it works.  We know this, because we grind it out character after character after character after character, and only the characters who hunt  tarantulas, stilt lizards, and the gangly elf ever get anywhere beyond journeyman.

For what it's worth, your longest-lived combat characters have skills that are pretty much what I'd expect anyone with that playtime to have, regardless of how they trained, based on my time being on staff and seeing my clan's PC's skill sheets. I don't know what else to say to convince you that the code is working fine, but of course you are free to believe what you want.

[Alesan]

Well, I've gotten a weapon skill to advanced without ever fighting those gangly or stilt things at all. I never actually did anything out of the ordinary with that character and my weapon skills rose anyway. Granted, I often have a lot of time to play, and decent wisdom helps it along. But it's still possible to do without doing anything unreasonable.

[lostinspace]

Well, I've gotten a weapon skill to advanced without ever fighting those gangly or stilt things at all. I never actually did anything out of the ordinary with that character and my weapon skills rose anyway. Granted, I often have a lot of time to play, and decent wisdom helps it along. But it's still possible to do without doing anything unreasonable.

Pretty much the same, on the one character I devoted to making into a badass warrior I hit Advanced weapon skills pretty quickly in a sparring clan. There was definitely a plateau after that, but mostly because my playtimes declined and I moved from being the one learning in the clan to one of the ones teaching.

[hopeandsorrow]

I've never played a warrior to advance weapon skills but hearing people talk about it scares me off from it.

[Synthesis]

I don't care whether you have access to the code or not...this statement is completely at odds with the experience of anyone who has attempted to skill up a warrior, ranger, or assassin the legit way.

We are telling you:  the code is not working the way you think it works.  We know this, because we grind it out character after character after character after character, and only the characters who hunt  tarantulas, stilt lizards, and the gangly elf ever get anywhere beyond journeyman.

For what it's worth, your longest-lived combat characters have skills that are pretty much what I'd expect anyone with that playtime to have, regardless of how they trained, based on my time being on staff and seeing my clan's PC's skill sheets. I don't know what else to say to convince you that the code is working fine, but of course you are free to believe what you want.

...that's because my longest-lived combat characters killed the shit out of tarantulas and stilt lizards, and they reached their guild maximums LONG before they actually died.

Giuseppe maxed slashing around 20-25 days played, but he was only at journeyman when he left the Byn at 15 days (after starting at apprentice, mind you, because of the starting location bonus...so I went from like 20% to 40% in 15 days).  However, probably the last 5 days of that were completely stagnant, wasted time. Then I joined Salarr, moved to stilt lizard country, and rocketed from low journeyman to master in 5-10 days (40% to 80% in 5-10 days).  That ranger dwarf whose name I can't remember ranger-maxed chopping and etwo at I don't know...15 or so, because he started out up north, and I -still- branched parry the old-fashioned way faster than just about any other ranger I've played.

I'm a pretty smart, observant dude, with a pretty good memory, most of the time.  Like...I obviously don't know exactly what the problem is here, but there is a pretty dramatic disconnect between how y'all think shit works and how it actually works.

[Nergal]

Okay, then. Let's get back on topic.

[Armaddict]

...well.  Or how it works and how you think it should work, Synth.

Edit:  Er, the answer to the above is 'of course' as it stands.  I meant this as in if we're told it's going up in a certain way...it's probably safer to assume the code isn't lying, and we're instead projecting an expectation for a certain piece of data that was previously a keystone, but apparently is not.  Maybe the 'chance to improve' is smaller on weapon skills altogether, or is on the same timer as something else, or something...so that it's always the last thing to improve.  Hell, I dunno, but normally staff don't tell me how code works, so I'm inclined to take that.

[hyzhenhok]

Nosave parry would be a nice roleplay tool, that's pretty much it.

If you want to fix combat skill gains (and IMO you should), there are a lot more direct ways to go about it.

[Large Hero]

Okay, then. Let's get back on topic.

...that's because my longest-lived combat characters killed the shit out of tarantulas and stilt lizards, and they reached their guild maximums LONG before they actually died.

But this is an important statement to address.

Nergal says Synthesis' long lived tarantula/lizard-hunting PCs are on par, code wise, with long-lived clan-sparring Warriors.

Synthesis says that his characters achieve that level of skill in a fraction of the time - and this matches the experience of others who have twinked up a PC. And is the crux of what the discussion has been about thus far: that "unrealistic" training provides better coded results.

It's unfortunate that there's a call for a topic change immediately after a key point is made.

Maybe a separate thread is in order?

I can't be alone in thinking that the brokenness of Arm's weapon skills is a problem that should be addressed.

[Desertman]

It's pretty simple.

The more you fail, the more you learn. That is undeniable and nobody is trying to deny it.

If you find ways to fail more often, you will learn faster.

If your clannies are slower than a stilt lizard and you go fight stilt lizards instead of spar them, then yes, you will advance faster.

That's basic math.

I don't think a single person, including staff, is denying that is the case.

The real question is, "Should things be changed to make player on player sparring more readily reliable for "fails" at higher levels?".

That I don't know, but that is the question.

I still stand behind my recommendation that we should just allow skill gains for successes as well. I showed up for sparring/fighting/hunting/archery/climbing training. I did those things. If I failed to do them or not shouldn't matter. I did them, and doing things makes you better at doing things.

If I show up to Muy Thai training and I throw fifty perfect thai kicks, I get better at doing thai kicks. I don't have to completely miss the bag like a retard to get better. I showed up, I trained, I got better.

Seems pretty simple to me.

Now, this may be a code issue. The way you "gain" might be something that is stock Diku code that can't be changed or something. I don't know.

All I DO know now is I have to throw in a picture about getting my mad gains...

[Nergal]

Maybe a separate thread is in order?

You're welcome to start one on your own. I have no interest in splitting this thread to discuss a false premise.

[Asmoth]

Okay, then. Let's get back on topic.

...that's because my longest-lived combat characters killed the shit out of tarantulas and stilt lizards, and they reached their guild maximums LONG before they actually died.

But this is an important statement to address.

Nergal says Synthesis' long lived tarantula/lizard-hunting PCs are on par, code wise, with long-lived clan-sparring Warriors.

Synthesis says that his characters achieve that level of skill in a fraction of the time - and this matches the experience of others who have twinked up a PC. And is the crux of what the discussion has been about thus far: that "unrealistic" training provides better coded results.

It's unfortunate that there's a call for a topic change immediately after a key point is made.

Maybe a separate thread is in order?

I can't be alone in thinking that the brokenness of Arm's weapon skills is a problem that should be addressed.

I have always know weapon skills to take for fucking ever to move. I always just chalked it up to the fact that it's because they are so powerful in pvp.

I've seen rangers that have had such high offense they could knock out Bahamet in a few rounds of hard hits to the head.

Yet get utterly destroyed by a byn warrior who did nothing but spar at late morning or whatever their schedule is.

So I've always viewed weapon skills as the tool of the pker and normal offense and defense as the tool of hunters and pve ers.

[Nergal]

The real question is, "Should things be changed to make player on player sparring more readily reliable for "fails" at higher levels?".

That I don't know, but that is the question.

This seems like something worth discussing in a separate thread. This thread is essentially about something that would be an RP tool. It would not impact skill gains positively or negatively.

[Desertman]

The real question is, "Should things be changed to make player on player sparring more readily reliable for "fails" at higher levels?".

That I don't know, but that is the question.

This seems like something worth discussing in a separate thread. This thread is essentially about something that would be an RP tool. It would not impact skill gains positively or negatively.

*nod* *nod*

[Chettaman]

I like the idea of nosave parry. But there's already a command for it.
rs
rp
rtwo

I don't mean to go against everything said, but just emote lowering your weapon. You can't parry if you don't have a weapon. You can't block if you don't have a shield. Bam. Now all you can do is dodge.

I imagine that when you become a master, facing another master who isn't trying their hardest isn't going to make you any better.

[Riev]

Moreso than NoSave Parry, I'd like to see more of a setEffort (x) sort of skill, wherein you aren't saving against using skills per se, but you are purposefully limiting yourself by a factor of (x). Make it setEffort low/medium/high/max or something so skillmaxers don't have the numbers down, but imagine setting your effort to low, as a Byn Sergeant, when first-sparring a Runner? You might not get skill gains but people won't see you fight at your best.


I would love to, in the middle of an RPT, be like "ALRIGHT ITS TIME TO BURN UP!" and seteffort max and obliterate everything because I was secretly stilt training.

[JackGibbons]

Moreso than NoSave Parry, I'd like to see more of a setEffort (x) sort of skill, wherein you aren't saving against using skills per se, but you are purposefully limiting yourself by a factor of (x). Make it setEffort low/medium/high/max or something so skillmaxers don't have the numbers down, but imagine setting your effort to low, as a Byn Sergeant, when first-sparring a Runner? You might not get skill gains but people won't see you fight at your best.


I would love to, in the middle of an RPT, be like "ALRIGHT ITS TIME TO BURN UP!" and seteffort max and obliterate everything because I was secretly stilt training.

This kind of thing is the most hilarious part of SOI which has this code. Do all your clan sparring at 40%, then get turnt for the orc invasion 'set effort 100' 'shout Elendil!'