Coming Soon: Discussion Thread (2020)

[gedweyignasia]

If you haven’t picked up on The Point, which is the Rebalance was made in order to use up more PC coin than before in consumables AND lesser coin returns so that gold starts having more value/meaning again, then...you’re missing the point.

It wasn't the point, but it certainly appears to be a result. Like I said, we're gathering data and we'll keep iterating. If it's something we like and want to keep, we'll probably start to balance spawns down so that consumables aren't required to complete an area. If it's something we don't like, we'll probably try to make sure players get more gold out of a run.

There's a lot of observing and then debating amongst devs/QC to figure out what kind of balance we should strike. We come to players with a plan and support each other's work in public discussion because we believe in each other, but internally we don't always see eye-to-eye on stuff, so we debate the heck out of stuff over and over and over to plan and polish before we make these changes.

[gedweyignasia]

And try not judging an area just in one single run. Maybe after running the same area 10 times you can get more accuraten stats.

Honestly, even 10 runs isn't going to be very informative. The treasure system is currently very, very noisy, so it's hard to judge. I could sit 10 chests in front of a Lv1 PC and they'd have very little hope of guessing what CR those chests were for; it'd pretty much only be clear if they got something epic. Chad is going through our 6000 lines of the loot table to help us do a little better, but it's going to be a slow process to get this where it should be.

Loot has been pretty sloppy on this server for a long time, and it's sneaky how the good loot locations slip into your head. I hear about players looting areas that used to have the best chests on the server (tied in quality with the Netherese Maze, but fewer in quantity) since the rebalance and being disappointed with what they find. It'll take a long while before they start to adjust their intuition, because the amount of randomness in the treasure system is a little high at the moment. Once we have something that creates a curvier distribution, we'll be in better shape.

[Bobthehero]

Oh yes. Down with UMD and wands, the fact their use is one of the first answers you get when you ask for ways to play a fighter better is a travesty, I want to play a fighter, not a gimped up gish, get out of there with wands and potions.

[gedweyignasia]

I, personally, would love to see that sort of non-buffing "I can stand on my own skill and two feet" style of build become relevant! It may also lower the overall need for consumables and lower the price of them on the markets, if only by a smidge since they're still expensive to make.

That's a change that I would wholeheartedly get behind, but remember that while potions and wands exist there will be balance concerns. I've never played a wealthy enough PC to throw wands/potions at my problems (except Lesser Restoration+Healing Kits when things get ugly), so that would be much more to my style. I would expect balance changes to happen gradually over time; as the server's power creep got worse, spawns slowly got better to respond. If the power creep is reversed, spawns will slowly get worse. Balancing between casters and martial classes has traditionally been about what items are available, but stuff like spawning Mords hordes can definitely level the playing field at higher levels. This is probably a discussion for another thread though.

[Snarfy]

(I hope we can all agree that it should not be MORE profitable for a level 30 PC to run Hilltop than it is for them to go through Greypeaks?)

100% agree.

Conversely... ( muhahaha! ), it should not be LESS profitable for a level 27(was it?) PC to run Reaching woods, Cloud Peaks, Lizard Caves, and Frost giants...

11260 + 3830 (gold found) = 15090
Heal potions alone: 7600
That's a profit of 7490

... than it is for a lvl 30 to run gibberling caves, and Uldoons:


(I just found all that in 15 minutes, 12,692gp made)



And while this is bound to change after non-locked containers get gimped fixed, I suppose I will have to be content with waiting for you guys to, as you say, "come up with a way to still align the PvE looting experience with the server vision where risk and reward are better aligned".

[Nemni]

Here we have two people logged into different servers. So they don't see each other in the player chat or player list, but now they can see each other in the scry. They can also send messages. The current syntax is: '>ct "character name" my message'. Or >crosstell instead of >ct. When you get a message it will appear as if it's written to yourself (since the engine requires a player to send from), but as you can see in the example the name of the player who sent it will also appear.

I should probably add a possibility to send to a player name instead of a character name too in the future. But all of that is less important than actually seeing others online on the scry I think.

[Steve]

It wasn't the point, but it certainly appears to be a result. Like I said, we're gathering data and we'll keep iterating....

The guinea pigs line up at the gates with torches and pitchforks!!

[Hoihe]

I, personally, would love to see that sort of non-buffing "I can stand on my own skill and two feet" style of build become relevant! It may also lower the overall need for consumables and lower the price of them on the markets, if only by a smidge since they're still expensive to make.

That's a change that I would wholeheartedly get behind, but remember that while potions and wands exist there will be balance concerns. I've never played a wealthy enough PC to throw wands/potions at my problems (except Lesser Restoration+Healing Kits when things get ugly), so that would be much more to my style. I would expect balance changes to happen gradually over time; as the server's power creep got worse, spawns slowly got better to respond. If the power creep is reversed, spawns will slowly get worse. Balancing between casters and martial classes has traditionally been about what items are available, but stuff like spawning Mords hordes can definitely level the playing field at higher levels. This is probably a discussion for another thread though.

One way I found it possible to do epic areas without buffs were vampiric weapons.

With vampiric weapons, it's less of an issue to get hit with unavoidable damage - which is the primary reason to buff (even getting AB+20 AC is not enough to avoiding losing a lot of HP, and enemies end up having enough AB to demand AC over 55 to not get hit frequently).

So perhaps adding the epic store some +2 EB vamp 2 weapons of all kinds could help reduce the reliance on buffs without really empowering muscle gishes.

[Svabodnik]

As for the first time in forever I'm not just swapping to level an alt once I hit one character to 30, I'm strangely able to give my two cents about something related to level-capped play.

I'm currently sticking to the Underdark, so I typically go to three locations for looting - Orghann Ruins/Great Hall (CR 25-28), Wilds Descent (CR 24, but I'd argue the mobs there are a bit more difficult than Great Hall), and Duergar Compound/Lava Cave (CR 21-24). To note, this selection of zones is not due to some risk/reward calculation, but that there are no other options really available in the UD, and I can't be bothered to deal with the breach spam of Netherese Ruins (although bypassing those mobs with an invisibility wand is a potential option, I'd simply rather not bother).

While I'm playing a self-buffer who typically does not have to rely on consumables (aside from a Bless Weapon wand I need to use to bypass the DR of the Pit Fiend boss in the Lava Cave), the layout of UD puts two of the areas I go to rather far off from fast-travel sites. This means on the typical run of the aforementioned zones, I'll be spending at least 3,400 gp in 'travel costs', adding about 1,600 gp more to that if I roll a 1 on a teleport check and have to use a scroll instead. I bring along two stacks of Healer's Kit +1s (20 lb) rather than rely on Heal potions to top myself off between encounters, and with looting have to constrain myself somewhat due to a Swashbuckler dip with base 14 STR. My method for opening chests involves hitting them repeatedly until little item bits fall out.

All that being said, while I don't keep track of each individual run's profits, the cash has been steadily rolling these past couple of weeks, and I'd even manage to snag a couple of 'epic' drops (a Cloak of Constitution +4 and a Helm of Deflection +4), along with an assortment of various +3 gear for later sale/trade/packratting. Most chests may have vendortrash, but apparently with enough grains of sand you get a desert. While the loot found in Duergar Compound/Lava Cave is fairly poor, likely due to the character being 9-6 levels above the CR, soloing the Pit Fiend gives a guaranteed 5k reward. For the other, more level-appropriate areas, I feel like the loot found within chests of has gotten slightly better.

[Hawke]

I just looted about 250 gold from the chest outside gibberling cave. That is different than the other thread I read saying that a cap of 50 gold for low levels. My PC is level 7 currently.

Also last Wednesday the same PC looted about 5 items from chests/skeleton in gibberling cave. Nothing crazy strong, but worth about 1100 each to FAI vendor.

[chad878262]

I just looted about 250 gold from the chest outside gibberling cave. That is different than the other thread I read saying that a cap of 50 gold for low levels. My PC is level 7 currently.

Also last Wednesday the same PC looted about 5 items from chests/skeleton in gibberling cave. Nothing crazy strong, but worth about 1100 each to FAI vendor.

Level 7 can lot low level areas and no cap. The chests will give under 100 gold and no or very few items to pve leveled PCs. This is as intended

[gedweyignasia]

I just looted about 250 gold from the chest outside gibberling cave. That is different than the other thread I read saying that a cap of 50 gold for low levels. My PC is level 7 currently.

I'd have to check the CR on that chest, but I think you're on the high side of being able to loot it. It's possible to get about 150 gold from the chests that won't give you loot anymore, but you're much more likely to get about 20-50. 200 or more certainly means that the chest is generating loot.

[izzul]

scenario

-Player A in server 1
-Player B in server 2

-player B enters server 1

will the player B name be updated in the Players list of player A in server 1?

[Nemni]

When player B joins the same server as player A it will be like just logging into the server as normal, so they will appear in player list and chat as always.

[izzul]

When player B joins the same server as player A it will be like just logging into the server as normal, so they will appear in player list and chat as always.

thank you, Arigatōgozaimashita