Skill Gain Alt Stats - Discussion and Feedback

[Kavrick]

It would just make sense of me to either have strength count for weapon skills as well, or have a weapon type or two in the strength category.

I think you could easily argue for blunt and axes to be strength, and have slashing/piercing be agility.

[Tuannon]

Should sap be strength, is a called shot with a kosh a power move? Consensus for or against?

[roughneck]

Should sap be strength, is a called shot with a kosh a power move? Consensus for or against?

I think it could be either, but, Enforcer is the only Master Sap class/subclass (I think), which is thematically a strength priority class, so it makes sense to me from that point to have it a strength skill.

[Armaddict]

Charge and trample make no sense in the strength category, they should be traded for weapon skills (there is a reason that horse-jockeys are very small and agile).

That makes to me, I'm happy to change those two to agility.

Endurance, maybe?  Riding as well for endurance, to be honest.

[flurry]

I'm curious why scan is 'wisdom' but 'watch' is agility. Do you require agility to watch someone's face? Or the southern direction? Why should this be the one perception skill that is agility?

Yeah I wasn't totally sure what to do with watch, happy to change it to wisdom.

Yeah, I was wondering about watch also. I could also see an argument for pairing it with endurance (since you have to maintain your attention) but wisdom is probably the most intuitive choice.

[Windstorm]

grinding isn't fun

I agree and it's part of why I don't like the change.

This isn't reducing grind, which is my problem with it. Just reducing skill timers makes it so players inclined to will.... drumroll.... grind more often, and without any investment in being any smarter. To me this isn't reducing grind, it's encouraging more of it, doubly so if you play a combat role often and take wisdom last.

[Kavrick]

This isn't reducing grind, which is my problem with it. Just reducing skill timers makes it so players inclined to will.... drumroll.... grind more often, and without any investment in being any smarter. To me this isn't reducing grind, it's encouraging more of it, doubly so if you play a combat role often and take wisdom last.

I hadn't really thought about this and I think I understand your point. I guess personally I don't actually tend to stop doing something just because I got a fail in, so I'd feel the effects differently. But I also know I play this game far more than some people do when it comes to hours-per-day, so it might feel bad for people who have less time to play? I'm not sure.

[Lotion]

If off and def have differing stats then this will have a profound impact on the long term gameplay of a very patient twink who focuses heavily on macroefficiency.

[Lotion]

If off and def have differing stats then this will have a profound impact on the long term gameplay of a very patient twink who focuses heavily on macroefficiency.

nevermind, from halaster in discord: [11:17 AM]Halaster: no they don't, right now offense and defense specifically are just wisdom.

[Halaster]

I get the idea of changing chopping and bludgeoning weapons to be str based, but does that then sort of pigeon-hole high strength people to those?  Meaning, we see even more of high-str folks focusing on those and ignoring slashing/piercing?

[Kavrick]

I get the idea of changing chopping and bludgeoning weapons to be str based, but does that then sort of pigeon-hole high strength people to those?  Meaning, we see even more of high-str folks focusing on those and ignoring slashing/piercing?

It's hard to say, I do think generally the better option is to make it so weapon skills use either strength of agi, based on what is higher but I don't know how hard that is to impliment code-wise.

My main concern is that the agility list is more than double the strength list and has a lot of really good stand-outs. Not to mention crafting and sneaky stuff.

I kinda feel bad for people who might want to play a strength race and find that their original niche (being good at combat) has kinda totally been taken over by agi races, along with all the utility.

That aside, I do have a question. How do you perceive Muls, Dwarves and Half Giants and their position in the game? Both mechanically and roleplay wise. That might be out of the scope of this thread but if we're talking about agility Vs strength I think the intended position of the races matters a lot.

[Krath]

I tend to agree with Kavrick...I think Pierce and Swords should be agility secondary, and Axes and Bludgeoning Strength. It would align it with the secondary skills that are specific for each weapon type:

Swords -> Riposte -> Agility as a Secondary Stat for Both
Pierce -> Backstab -> Agility as a Secondary Stat for Both
Bludgeon -> Sap -> Strength as a Secondary Stat for Both
Axe -> Hack -> Strength as a Secondary Stat for Both

Non-Weapon Skill Changes I would make:

Bandage -> Agility as a Secondary Stat
Poison -> Agility as a Secondary Stat
Guarding -> Agility as a Secondary Stat
Threaten -> Agility as a Secondary Stat
Sling Use -> Strength as a Secondary Stat
Kick -> Strength as a Secondary Stat

Watch -> Just Wisdom
Search -> Just Wisdom
Direction Sense -> Just Wisdom
Ride -> Just Wisdom

[roughneck]

I'm on the same page as Kavrick and Krath.

[dumbstruck]

Yeah, I like the changes @Krath is suggesting. The way that the weapons break down works well with classes are currently designed, as most of the pure combat classes if not all have all the weapon skills, and most of the more utility heavy classes have bludgeoning and piercing. As far as I know, the only classes that only have piercing are the trade classes which should also have a secondary agility bonus to help their crafting so it syncs well with the natural inclination of priorities of those classes, while giving people with mixed classes the ability to focus on strength or agility focus or both, while not impacting the pure combat classes negatively as far as I can tell.

[Bogre]

grinding isn't fun

I agree and it's part of why I don't like the change.

This isn't reducing grind, which is my problem with it. Just reducing skill timers makes it so players inclined to will.... drumroll.... grind more often, and without any investment in being any smarter. To me this isn't reducing grind, it's encouraging more of it, doubly so if you play a combat role often and take wisdom last.

I agree with Windstorm's point. Skill timers are such that you are cannot go up 10 ticks in an RL day, or whatever, which discourages constant  grinding of skills. Decreasing that means you can maybe get a couple more gains if you stay logged in for a long time, but it doesn't really change the more casual play pattern of log in once or every couple days and train. One main 'grind' people feel is that people feel like they start really weak and don't get up to capable for a few days played - this change might make it slightly quicker for those who play a lot, but matters less for those people who log in far more intermittently.

The other grind is that some skills (combat skills, namely) simply won't increase because the rate of failure is low, and sometimes the rate of skill gain even if failing is low. Reduced timers won't really matter if you're never triggering the timer by gaining.

I moreover think that the characters to benefit, if they were spending that long online, would be high-stat, combat-stat prioritized characters, and helps out already powerful races (dwarves, muls, elves) that need very insanely godlike in PVP and very dangerous to other PCs. And that's not even considering ways to boost stats, which presumeably would then help timers.

-------------------

My thought would rather be help the initial curve out and make the top-end progress require investment (but not impossible flailing like now). That would be to increase the % chance to gain from novice->apprentice, apprentice->jman, and then once there you have a bit tougher of a time. You could even make it so novice->apprentice combat skills bump by 2 per gain, and then slow to 1, keeping offense/defense where its at, which I believe would starkly improve the time-to-not-newbie, get people on an even playing field faster.

 Obviously I don't think anyone wants it to be laughably easy to get maxed out combat chars, since those are overwhelmingly powerful vs PVE and PVP balance, and makes it hard for new PCs to catch up or be meaningful. But in a season, there is a limiter in the eventual end of season so you don't want everyone frustrated at a 'plateau' and trying to metagame past it.


 

[Roon]

Stats need to be made less random before they're made even more important.

[shadeoux]

Stats need to be made less random before they're made even more important.

I'd like to see the ability to swap stats around.

Swap Strength Wisdom
Unswap Strength Wisdom

[Roon]

I don't think that would do a whole lot. You already get to prioritize your stats at creation, so there's no need to swap them afterwards. They come out in the order you chose, although class and age can affect the final outcome. Swapping stats around doesn't address any of the problems, and would rarely serve any purpose anyway. Unless you opt not to prioritize for some reason, you don't get stat rolls that should warrant swapping. There's no such thing as prioritizing strength and then entering the game to find that you got low strength but high wisdom.

Unless you meant swapping back and forth at will throughout the character's life, in which case I'm highly doubtful that such a feature would ever be added to the game.

The problem was never that the game gives you stats that are the wrong way around. It's the fact that your overall rolls can be junk or amazing, and this has a significant impact on what a character is capable of. That impact only increases if multiple stats determine skill timers instead of just wisdom. There really isn't room for this level of randomness in a game that features both FFA PvP and an overwhelming emphasis on (and rewards for) living a long time. It's simply unhealthy for the game.

There should be no such thing as characters who have godlike stats, or crappy stats, through sheer luck. Each race should have a fixed pool of total stats, and then some degree of randomness can determine their exact distribution. That leaves plenty of room for characters to be different, but you never just get shafted or handed a character that's objectively superior.

In a better system, you might roll...

17 14 12 7
14 13 13 10
19 16 7 6

But not...

19 17 17 15

or

14 9 8 7

[Dresan]

Just a quick summary of thoughts:

1. As its been said above this makes wisdom more of a dump stat. For some ideas how to make wisdom more desirable and just some ideas on stats in general to improve mundane selection (especially in this setting) see the following threads: Wisdom and Discussion on stats

2. This does nothing to fix skill grind. I recommend just doubling the learning gains at the beginning of the season, then upping that to times X5 at the 50% mark of the season, and then upping that further to X10 learning gains around the 85% mark of the season. One thing the game is missing is a way to keep the player-base coming back especially as a season ends and your character dies. I think from experience we've seen once a game is closing people just stop logging in, doubly so if their character died. Slowly upping skill gains through the season would help with that.

3. Ultimately the main concerns with learning skills too quickly is often centered around combat. More so these days since the natural weaknesses of heavy combat classes (like the scary poisons) have become harder to pull off over time due to changes in the game. I think by solving that first as discussed here: Combat, it'll be easier to improve skill gains across the board without suddenly ending up with combat juggernauts everywhere.

Anything we can do to continue to encourage people to play mundane characters instead of mages/high karma options is strongly recommended as well.

[Kavrick]

There should be no such thing as characters who have godlike stats, or crappy stats, through sheer luck. Each race should have a fixed pool of total stats, and then some degree of randomness can determine their exact distribution. That leaves plenty of room for characters to be different, but you never just get shafted or handed a character that's objectively superior.

It's a drum I've bashed since I've started playing. The complete RNG in character creation stats feels like a relic of a bygone age and there are good reasons why modern day rpgs, both tabletop, text-based and any other type of roleplaying game have pretty much completely removed RNG from character creation. Sure there are still some stragglers, but the most popular ones have completely gotten rid of it. Even old editions of Dungeons and Dragons had stat arrays as an alternative to rolling dice for your stats.

[Windstorm]

Just a quick summary of thoughts:

1. As its been said above this makes wisdom more of a dump stat. For some ideas how to make wisdom more desirable and just some ideas on stats in general to improve mundane selection (especially in this setting) see the following threads: Wisdom and Discussion on stats

2. This does nothing to fix skill grind. I recommend just doubling the learning gains at the beginning of the season, then upping that to times X5 at the 50% mark of the season, and then upping that further to X10 learning gains around the 85% mark of the season. One thing the game is missing is a way to keep the player-base coming back especially as a season ends and your character dies. I think from experience we've seen once a game is closing people just stop logging in, doubly so if their character died. Slowly upping skill gains through the season would help with that.

3. Ultimately the main concerns with learning skills too quickly is often centered around combat. More so these days since the natural weaknesses of heavy combat classes (like the scary poisons) have become harder to pull off over time due to changes in the game. I think by solving that first as discussed here: Combat, it'll be easier to improve skill gains across the board without suddenly ending up with combat juggernauts everywhere.

Anything we can do to continue to encourage people to play mundane characters instead of mages/high karma options is strongly recommended as well.

Absolutely fantastic post, with suggestions that really attempt to solve The Grind. The current proposed changes simply don't, and in ways I'd even argue exacerbate them.

[Dune Bunny]

With many posters feeling this doesn't lessen the grind, and Dresan's idea for gains, perhaps something else is also worthy of consideration?

Maybe a decent idea would be to take the timer reduction away from secondary stats, and replace it with an increased skill gain based on said stats? A time reduction is nice for very busy/active players, but for many, they won't really notice a change in the timer when they're not constantly working on skills, are out rping, attending this event, etc.

Say, as an example that a PC's sneak skill gains come in increments of 1 with each failure.

PC has an agility score of X, and each time they fail now, that X translates to additional gains. Say that X is a .25 increase, (with higher values meaning more?) making a failure now a 1.25 increase in the sneak skill for each fail within the timer.

This lets people get more out of their skill ups, without trying to work around timers to level as quickly as possible. The timers stay the same, but the gains increase, making a notable difference without impacting play preferences.

[Riev]

Tongue in cheek:

double the timer on combat skills
double the gain when a fail tick occurs


The only people it "punishes" are people who play multiple-hours per day, but if you log in every day you'll still be able to keep up, as it were. It would require less Days Played, but a similar amount of Time Played (10d played won't matter as much as you playing for a month consistently).

Numbers obviously could change, but I feel this would help "the grind", as I see the grind being affected more by opportunity to fail than by the timer being less. If I find that opportunity to get my fails once a week, and only get one point out of it, it feels bad.

[roughneck]

Folks who say this would not help the grind, what in the world?

If the stat you would naturally prioritize then helps you gain skills faster, you are grinding less. Couple that with higher starting skills for mundane classes and subclasses, and we are on fast-track baby.

Based on Halaster's first post. The worst case scendario with low wis and secondary stat is it remains the same as before... so your grind is either the same or it's better. Neutral is your worst case scenario.

Randomized stats is a completely different topic.

Halaster's post:

- High wisdom, low secondary stat - It will be a little slower in that skill than if you just had a high wisdom in the old system.
- High wisdom, high secondary stat - It will be noticeably faster in that skill than the old system where if you just had a high wisdom.
- Low wisdom, low secondary stat - It will be about the same as the old system if you had a low wisdom.
- Low wisdom, high secondary stat - It will be noticeably faster in that skill than the old system where if you just had a high secondary stat

[Halaster]

I agree with Windstorm's point. Skill timers are such that you are cannot go up 10 ticks in an RL day, or whatever, which discourages constant  grinding of skills. Decreasing that means you can maybe get a couple more gains if you stay logged in for a long time, but it doesn't really change the more casual play pattern of log in once or every couple days and train. One main 'grind' people feel is that people feel like they start really weak and don't get up to capable for a few days played - this change might make it slightly quicker for those who play a lot, but matters less for those people who log in far more intermittently.

The other grind is that some skills (combat skills, namely) simply won't increase because the rate of failure is low, and sometimes the rate of skill gain even if failing is low. Reduced timers won't really matter if you're never triggering the timer by gaining.

I moreover think that the characters to benefit, if they were spending that long online, would be high-stat, combat-stat prioritized characters, and helps out already powerful races (dwarves, muls, elves) that need very insanely godlike in PVP and very dangerous to other PCs. And that's not even considering ways to boost stats, which presumeably would then help timers.

-------------------

My thought would rather be help the initial curve out and make the top-end progress require investment (but not impossible flailing like now). That would be to increase the % chance to gain from novice->apprentice, apprentice->jman, and then once there you have a bit tougher of a time. You could even make it so novice->apprentice combat skills bump by 2 per gain, and then slow to 1, keeping offense/defense where its at, which I believe would starkly improve the time-to-not-newbie, get people on an even playing field faster.

 Obviously I don't think anyone wants it to be laughably easy to get maxed out combat chars, since those are overwhelmingly powerful vs PVE and PVP balance, and makes it hard for new PCs to catch up or be meaningful. But in a season, there is a limiter in the eventual end of season so you don't want everyone frustrated at a 'plateau' and trying to metagame past it.
 

Just because a change doesn't fix all scenarios doesn't mean a change shouldn't happen.  You guys are right, this doesn't do much for some groups of people, but it does for other groups.  It's still OK to make the change.