> That undermines the achievement of the people who beat ToMM and is strictly going against the idea of a good progression system. Not everyone needs to have every item and if they want the item, they should have to put in the work for it.
Not everybody can complete Tomm. Sometimes it's your connection or your PC or the fact (like in my case) that I'm travelling all time (due to my job) and keeping a schedule with other players to do stuff like Tomm is almost impossible. In the past I had more time and was usually on top of the latest developments of the game (I was in the first reported successful run on Master Svardborg, with you by the way)
Your point of view is very limited to the conditions you see fo yourself. Other players may have different constraints and they have right to grow and get the latest stuff, maybe in different ways than you do.
With my proposal if you can complete difficult content you will get the good stuff first and can use it to farm and sell more. People not able to complete the content will take more time and arrive at the stuff later on, or if they want they will open the wallet and buy it from the auction, which is good for the game as somebody has to pay for the servers, the developers and Cryptics profit.
They should have made the ToMM weapons unbound, that would adress your point right? No need for other ways of getting them, since u can do what u want, and buy them with the AD you earn.
I was thinking the same thing, it would be nice if the weapons were unbound, as they are obtained through RNG. However, an alternative set would be good too, one in MW professions would help to keep professions relevant, and equally hard to obtain in a different way, unlocking any new MW recipes generally requires you have unlocked the previous ones, and that's not easy.
Alternative sets that are comparable don't undermine the achievement of acquiring the absolute BIS set, just like Alabaster and Mountaineer sets didn't undermine the achievement of getting Burnished weapons. The Alabaster set wasn't absolutely BiS, and they didn't have the same bragging rights that Burnished had, but they were comparable, and a skilled player with Alabaster, could out dps someone with Burnished. Having Burnished weapons didn't give anyone such a significant advantage that Lionheart does right now.
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thefabricantMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 5,248Arc User
That undermines the achievement of the people who beat ToMM and is strictly going against the idea of a good progression system. Not everyone needs to have every item and if they want the item, they should have to put in the work for it.
No one cares that you beat ToMM. It is not work to play a video game... So unless you are committed to invite new players and those inexperienced in running TOMM every single time you run it, and take the time to slow everyone down and explain the mechanics and provide helpful tips, then you shouldn't gate the gear. Because otherwise, it is people like you that go against the health of the game.
You do not need lionheart weapons to beat any of the content in the game. The best items, should come from the hardest content. If equivalent items dropped from easier content then there would be no reason to run ToMM.
Feedback Goal: Allow old gear to be upgraded and retain some level of viability
Feedback Functionality: With each module, new gear is released and new content is introduced. But as many, many others have pointed out, there's a large swath of us who either do not have the means to complete the content due to player restrictions (lots and lots of scrolls) or IL requirements that are much greater than what Cryptic has envisioned.
In order to help curb this and potentially introduce a facet into the game that you guys may or may not have considered is allowing older items, whether they be artifacts, weapons, neck or belt pieces the opportunity to upgrade to a higher tier, such as mythical or mythical +.
This raises the item level of the gear, it's base stats and it's unique effectiveness. For instance, lets say that the newest campaign has released item level 1250 (which they just did) piece, which is great but the effects of the item are not desirable or you simply cannot acquire the item due to whatever circumstances hinder you.
Allow for an older item, let's use the weapons from River District/Cloaked Ascendancy for example, to be upgraded to mythical and be shy of the best weapons currently in the game, the Lionheart set. Maybe even have them be a smidge behind Alabaster and the others introduced in mod 16. I'll provide a quick example.
When you use an encounter power, you will become Far-Influenced, which increases your Outgoing Damage by 4% and grants you a random buff for 10 seconds.
Relentless — Increases your Critical Strike by 2500.
Tainted Attack — Enemies you attack will take additional damage over time.
Impeding Death — Enemies you attack will explode on death, doing damage to other foes.
You can only be Far-Influenced once every 30 seconds.
The current stats of the Lionheart Greatsword is as follows:
Item Level: 1,010
3,643-4,452 Damage
+808 Combined Rating +9,696 Power +2,020 Armor Penetration +2,020 Accuracy
Increases damage dealt and outgoing healing by up to 10% whenever your Stamina is full. Effect decreases as Stamina decreases. Decreases damage received by up to 10% whenever your Stamina is empty. Effect decreases as Stamina is increases.
Now, there's a rather healthy gap presented here and while this may be a bit of a stretch as an example, it should still serve to state the intent. If you guys introduced a legacy quest that had the player revisit old campaigns, to whatever reasonable extent you guys deem necessary for whatever piece of equipment they hope to do this with, they can raise the Aboleth Greatsword in this example, to mythical levels.
The end result of this will be (super rough example basing it off of the current Alabaster set with some modifications)
When you use an encounter power, you will become Far-Influenced, which increases your Outgoing Damage by 5% and grants you a random buff for 15 seconds.
Relentless — Increases your Critical Strike by 2500 and Critical Severity by 3%.
Tainted Attack — Enemies you attack will take 20/30/40 magnitude weapon damage over time from your attacks.
Impeding Death — Enemies you attack will explode on death, doing damage to other foes. The damage lingers and burns surrounding foes for 120% weapon damage over 3 seconds.
You can only be Far-Influenced once every 15 seconds.
Yes, I know that I have it's duration and it's activation on the same timer of 15 seconds. Consider it to be a rotating buff that will keep itself going so long as encounters can flow with a 15 second rotation. Akin to the old Feytouched enchantment. Now, with this, the old Aboleth Greatsword is still viable but may not be as desirable as the current weapons. It's still doing less peak damage than both the Alabaster and Lionheart set yet, it has features that might make it desirable for players to continue to use without feeling left behind or no longer using the items they like. Also, I raised it's base damage but reduced it's peak damage. So average damage won't be impacted as hard. But huge single hits will not be able to reach the levels of Alabaster or Lionheart.
With each mod introduction that brings about new items that would make the old obsolete, introduce a new legacy quest in the old module that would allow for another incremental increase. You could literally have it look something like this.
The further back the item was introduced, the more work will be involved in bringing said item up to it's max potential based upon the current meta.
So long as it's continually getting small but meaningful upgrades that the player needs to work for. And please don't bring into the foray something like Black Ice or Voninblod charging. No one liked that. Literally no one.
Folks may be more inclined to go through older content if they know they can keep certain pieces of their equipment viable for longer. Keep a really close eye on items that may cause an imbalance on your design and goals, such as the recently nerfed Demogorgon set.
Nonetheless, I don't think anyone would be opposed to this idea. I also HIGHLY encourage you guys to consider doing something similar to this for gear. Use seals, use whatever currency you like but, allow there to be legendary helms, chest, arms and leg pieces already. Utilizing this same technique, you can appease a whole swath of players who are livid that the gear that they worked so hard for is now obsolete and allows for a much greater variance than the current cookie cutter gear sets you see all over the place today. If you guys don't want to do that, that's fine but, the upgradable artifacts absolutely should be able to be upgraded in such a fashion.
Risks & Concerns: This could reduce the desirability of newly introduced items to a marginal degree. The sense of rush needed to push through the new content may not be as prevalent and may in turn allow the module more dwell time. The new items should always be of a higher item level and higher base stats than the old items fully upgraded. Obviously the above is just an example and I leave you guys to determine the formula necessary to pull this off without hindering your design intentions going forward. Someone in the latest and greatest gear will still be technically capable of more but, it'll help close the gap; even if it's just marginal.
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gabrieldourdenMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,212Arc User
> @tom#6998 said: > (Quote) > They should have made the ToMM weapons unbound, that would adress your point right? No need for other ways of getting them, since u can do what u want, and buy them with the AD you earn.
Right. As it was for Castle Never weapons. Obviously they would have a very high price on the auction as Castle Never weapons had
Le-Shan: HR level 80 (main)
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
You do not need lionheart weapons to beat any of the content in the game. The best items, should come from the hardest content. If equivalent items dropped from easier content then there would be no reason to run ToMM.
Yes, there is no reason to run ToMM. There is no reason to run Cloak Tower either but it still pops up in the que... ToMM is such a small part of the game and very few people do it. You say that since few can do it, that ToMM should have the best rewards. I just disagree, that's all. Since so few people do it why give it any love at all?
And since you don't need lionheart to beat any of the game, why gatekeep it in ToMM at all?
In an earlier post, I outlined how Player Progression is directly affected by the health of the economy and access to things like wards, mount packs, etc.
The take away is that the game needs more AD sinks to skim currency out of the economy.
What's the problem with the economy?
The PC ZAX exchange has been backlogged for a long time. To convert your AD to Zen tends to take a month or more. - This means the economy is static.
A static economy stunts player progression and leaves the marketplace ripe for abuse.
Example: Pres Wards are hugely important for a player to upgrade their character. On console the market is fluid. If any one person tries to monopolize pres wards and inflate the price, other players will react by slightly undercutting him. This keeps the price stable. They can do this because any player can buy pres wards by converting AD to Zen almost immediately. ... The market self-corrects.
In a static market like PC, things are different. One rich player or group of players can monopolize pres wards and inflate the price. Other players can react, but not until they can buy more zen. Because the backlog is so long, the market will be extremely slow to correct, leaving the monopoly intact for a long period of time.
^ This is why the backlog is so bad for player progression. It leaves item prices ultra-high and slows players ability to improve. Lack of improvements leave players bored because their progression is stunted.
Consoles are not immune either. The PS4 market is the youngest, has more swings, and still caps-out at times.
The Xbox market is the healthiest, but I've been playing for 2 years and can see it creeping up. When I first started playing, the ZAX hovered at 500, now it hovers around 550. Not a huge change, but it is creeping up slowly.
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Feedback Goal
We need more AD Sinks to normalize the economy.
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Feedback Functionality
Add a Lottery
I'm thinking like a wheel you can spin to get rewards. Pay a set amount of AD for a spin. Drops should be something like lockboxes.
Why is the Lottery different than Lockboxes? Lockboxes require Enchanted Keys, which you can only get from the Zen store. If the ZAX is backlogged, keys are out of reach. The Lottery removes AD from the economy without needing the exchange.
Risks & Concerns: Drops should be regulated so they don't flood the makertplace with rare items. Although, I doubt that would be a terrible negative. As long as there's lots of AD coming out of the economy, it's an overall positive.
--
Add a ZAX Tax
There would be no tax on buying AD with Zen, but buying Zen with AD would have a 1-10% tax. This will constently drain AD out of the economy.
You could also vary the tax based on the health of the platform, for example; Xbox may only have a 1-2% tax, but PC with the worse economy may have a 5-10% tax.
Risks & Concerns: Players would be mad. Most players don't understand how the economy works and wuold see it as a negative. But no real-world exchange works without some kind of fee.
Players may be hesitant to buy AD if they know they'll get taxed on the way back when buying Zen again. I'm not sure that's a negative though. If players hold their investment in Zen, it's still a form of limiting how much currency is in the economy.
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Reinstate the AH Fee for VIP Players
VIP players can game the AH by pulling listings down freely and reposting. AH Fees should be required, aka your listing fee gets paid when you post. If the items sells, you get the fee back. If the listing runs out of time, you get the fee back. But if you pull a listing down early, you lose the fee.
I would also suggest Listings stay up for 7 days instead of 5 days. Players can still play the market, but they need to account for the cost if they want to take listings down early.
Risks & Concerns: VIP players will be mad, but overall it will be good for the game.
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Player Housing
Yes, I know the devs have said they don't want to do player housing, but I think it could be managed.
First Idea: Add extra rooms or another floor to the Workshop. The instance is already designed to be upgradable. Remember Skyrim houses? You have a vendor which allows you to buy rooms, buy furniture, maybe have different decoration sets you can buy. It's all purchasable with AD. You want the Halloween kitchen? Knock yourself out. You want the Bridal bedroom suite? Buy it from the vendor.
Cons: Players can't invite other players to the instance.
Second Idea: An instance with a farm that has steep AD requirements to buy, upgrade, and maintain. Similar in functionality to the Stronghold, you can invite other players if you want. The farm requires AD to decorate it, buy livestock, add rooms, etc. The farm requires AD to maintain it or it goes into disrepair. Why would you want the farm beyond decoration? Maybe there's a minidungeon at the back of the property? Maybe there's a storyline the same way the Stronghold has? In another post I suggested a randomized mini-dungeon system like ME's. I think this would be a perfect place for something like that. Players can invite other players to their house instance.
Cons: devs have made it clear that the server can't support tons of new instances. The solution is to make this feature very expensive. I'm thinking at least 10 million AD just to get access to the property, then you need more AD to build the structure and follow the questline. The end-goal being that they have access to a mini-dungeon at the end. The instance needs constant maintanence cost. If they don't keep up with it, they lose access to the mini-dungeon and the property starts to fall into disrepair.
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More AD Sink to Strongholds
Strongholds have an AD Donation thing already. I think that should be a much larger part of the requirements. Strongholds could use an update anyway.
Risks & Concerns: I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
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Buy Dungeon Chest Keys with AD
You don't want to grind Chult again to get chest keys? Allow keys to be purchased with AD. Honeslty, if players have finished a campaign, the last thing they want to go is grind through it again for chest keys. Give them an option where they can be bought with AD.
Risks & Concerns: Players could stockpile keys and run dungeons repeatedly during 2X events — However, they do this already. It should encourage players to spend more time in dungeons and it's removing AD from the game.
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Add Old Fashion and Appearance Items to an AD Store
You have lots of old gear that's only really useful as appearance items, but it's scattered all over the place. Why not put it in one store and let players shop it using AD?
Risks & Concerns: I guess just the time it takes to build the store. Otherwise it seems like a no-brainer.
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Health Stones / Life Scrolls Purchasable with AD
First off, I'd say both Health Stones and Scrolls are far too easy to get. These are valuable items that should be at a premium. As it stands now, players consume them at an alarming rate. They are a handycap that promotes poor gameplay.
They should be removed from other sources and instead be purchasable from a normal vendor for Ad. Cost should be controlled so they are somewhat expensive.
---
Those are my thoughts. I very much think the economy is an important part of Neverwinter. To a large extent it is a game within a game. Some players spend lots of time just combing the AH for profits and finding ways to earn currencies.
It's also integral to player's continued progression. You also have to consider that if Neverwinter gets more popular, more active players = more AD in the economy. You'll need more ways to skim AD out to keep the economy healthy.
Post edited by sumplkrum#5169 on
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thefabricantMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 5,248Arc User
Yes, there is no reason to run ToMM. There is no reason to run Cloak Tower either but it still pops up in the que... ToMM is such a small part of the game and very few people do it. You say that since few can do it, that ToMM should have the best rewards. I just disagree, that's all. Since so few people do it why give it any love at all?
And since you don't need lionheart to beat any of the game, why gatekeep it in ToMM at all?
So because there is no reason to run cloak tower, there should be no reason to run ToMM? Ok, lets follow that logic to its natural conclusion and just remove rewards from everything. ToMM is an example of a good design, you put in effort, you have something to show from it. Cloak Tower is a good example of putting in no effort and getting no reward for it. Maybe if cloak tower was challenging, it would actually have a decent loot table.
Designing a game around the lowest common denominator is a quick way to kill it, as anyone who would form a part of the core community of a game would quickly lose interest and move on and then all the new players who come wondering in would have no community to engage with.
People need to learn to accept that not every piece of content (this includes items) in the game is designed for every player. You don't see me campaigning for the removal of PVP, despite the fact that I have no interest in playing it.
That [different ways to achieve bis gear] undermines the achievement of the people who beat ToMM and is strictly going against the idea of a good progression system. Not everyone needs to have every item and if they want the item, they should have to put in the work for it.
I can respect that opinion. However, it is one opinion among many other respectable opinions. Furthermore, "not everyone needs to have every item" is nothing that directly concerns you or your gameplay. Although I tend to agree (I personally don't need ToMM gear, because I am not interested in running the hardest dungeon available), I generally think one should be careful presiding over the needs of other players. However, love it when you are being constructive and focused on the health of the game for all players (which is most of the time)
noone cares that some casual players cant get the best endgame gear. Anyway, as long as you dont spend most of your time in leveling zones, helping new players understand and learn the game, you shouldnt be able to get any gear at all. Its people like you that let to the game beeing dumbed and borring.
A bit to aggressive for my taste. Also a little bit misleading. As far as I understand the discussion, most casual and semi-casual players (including players that have been bis at some point, but don't have the time to remain bis currently) are ok with the fact, that they cannot obtain the best endgame gear due to time constraints. What they would like, though, and I think that is a respectable opinion as well: - Have alternative ways to get gear that is not bis, but close enough to bis, so that they can play through all except the hardest content the way they like (e.g. with less challenge, e.g. "dumbed down and borring in your polite words)
Obviously, the "dumbed down" gear for the casual players needs to be obtainable within the time frame they can afford. As mentioned, it does not need to be endgame gear, but it should allow them to run through non-endgame dungeons, including the dungeon of the last mod, in a "more casual" way (e.g. the way they like to play the game).
Therefore, if we respect both opinions, of the bis-players and the casuals, the "dumbed down" gear needs to be better than the gear provided by the dungeon of the last mod, but inferior to the endgame gear provided by the dungeon of the current mod.
Not sure if it has been mentioned but epic quality refinement stones (ES r5, MoP 4/5) should drop in the late game epics also. The item description on the enchanting stone says they do but they don't.
Upgrading enchantments/runestones is an important part of character progession in Neverwinter after you get the gear that's been labeled "BiS" by the community. The level of runestones and enchantments rewarded have been increased from lockboxes so I believe it would be reasonable to allow at least the epic quality refining stones to drop at the rate of the ES6 current rate (competing with the rank 6 would likely increase the value of those)
Personally, if I had the refining stones more often enough for an upgrade, I'd be more willing to buy wards for the attempt. These days I just often wait for 2x stones and/or Bazaar sales which stagnates (some) progression.
You do not need lionheart weapons to beat any of the content in the game. The best items, should come from the hardest content. If equivalent items dropped from easier content then there would be no reason to run ToMM.
Yes, there is no reason to run ToMM. There is no reason to run Cloak Tower either but it still pops up in the que... ToMM is such a small part of the game and very few people do it. You say that since few can do it, that ToMM should have the best rewards. I just disagree, that's all. Since so few people do it why give it any love at all?
And since you don't need lionheart to beat any of the game, why gatekeep it in ToMM at all?
The correct aprouch here would be the weapons to be unbound, so the top players could make some ad and low equipped player would have the options to put ad on it...
I personally think mostly would have much mroe powerup investing in Runes and enchants but there is people that would buy it...
For Brag rights it should give a Title, or a Skin (for weapon or armor or even a mount skin...) i believe each dungeon should have at least 1 unique "skin gift" in the first comletion...
Risks & Concerns: I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
A possible solution could be, for every +X amount of AD donated (100,000 max) then +X more rAD that can be refined during that day. The Result would be, you can refine as much rAD as you donate.
The correct aprouch here would be the weapons to be unbound, so the top players could make some ad and low equipped player would have the options to put ad on it...
Yeah, that is - not surprisingly - on the wishlist of the "top players". Making "some ad" is perfectly fine with me.
However, there is some duplicity in such a wish and there could be risks for the overall health of the game: - it somewhat defeats the frequently voiced argument (often by the same top players), that bis gear "needs to be earned", "needs to be worked for" - buying bis gear with AD is "pay to win", generally despised by most players (including those that sell stuff for profit) - if prices are too high, the funds of the players scrambling to the top will become depleted and at the same time the coffers of the top players will overflow. This will tend to increase the gap between top players and players trying to chase to the top. This could affect the long-term health of the game, in particular if the top content is extremely hard (ToMM), so that only a small percentage has a chance at completing it.
For the above mentioned reason(s) I personally would prefer, that bis gear remains bound (to account). Non-bis gear (for instance of the dungeon of the last mod), which is easier to obtain and therefore will not sell at outrageous prices, can be non-bound. Still somewhat ptw ....
Talking about reasons to run content? Well, there's no real reason to play the game at all, except for enjoyment. Some people get enjoyment by being elite, some enjoy games for story lines and the progression of that story, some enjoy number crunching and theory crafting, some enjoy farming and crafting items, some enjoy fighting against other players, some enjoy the scenery and graphics, and many gain enjoyment from a mixture of things. At the end of the day, the only reason to run any dungeon is for enjoyment regardless if the enjoyment comes in any of the forms stated previously or others.
Introducing alternative weapon sets that are comparable to Lionheart weapons, albeit with different bonuses that would not be BiS for the meta, would not deter people from gaining enjoyment from running the hardest or easiest content in the game. In fact, it would open the doors for more people to partake in that enjoyment. Most groups wont accept people if they think that player would make the chance at success worse, or harder than they deem fit. Having alternative sets would increase the effectiveness of players who have not acquired Lionheart weaps yet (replace with X, Y, Z for future difficult content), and as a result increase the number of players who could then run ToMM and use the alternatives as stepping stones to get the BiS item. This is exactly how Alabaster weapons were treated by many, others stuck with Alabaster as they didn't see a need to spend resources to upgrade further being satisfied with what they had, and there's nothing wrong with that, it didn't stop them from running LoMM.
The only reason I could see in defending a stance in keeping the hardest content in the game available for fewer people is to maintain current status quo, and I doubt that is good for the game moving forward, as the current status quo is part of what got us to start discussing how to make the game better in the first place.
I think it's fairly clear that a very, very small subset of players was very happy with TOMM and the relative "rarity" of players completing the runs and selling the gear.
And most of the rest are annoyed by the rewards being locked away out of their reach.
Think that sums it up well enough for us to move on?
As this is within the theme, I will talk about something that is very comprehensive. When a new Dungeon or Trial is completed, it is a reward, as all your effort is directed towards this content. Wow how happy I was when I completed my first CN, FBI, MSP, MSVA, ToNG, CoDG and CR. At that time it was something that my emotions oscillated a lot, because when I failed I knew that I would have to go after improving my equipment and even frustrated I still had the desire to reach my goal, which made me evolve. At that time it was much more difficult to be a DPS than it is today. I ran CoDG myself enough to upgrade weapons. I didn't feel comfortable doing something that if I died, I was able to make the other 9 fail. When META was Buffs / Debuffs, there was a lot of that, there were 4 other players playing for you. I was the one who took the sword vs Strahd Von Zarovich, and I was responsible for ensuring that there was no flaw in the mechanics of permadeath.
Mod 16 came, the change module. In the first few weeks of LoMM, I already knew that I would not run, always the elite players that many of them tested were going to go. In the following weeks I will take a chance and find out from my own exp (I had read in the forums or in the game chats) that my DPS class was weak and that there were better options. It discouraged me, I had a lot more equipment than many who were finishing there. Launches ToMM, changes to the DPS formula that excited me again and as it is a Trial, you join groups for Training, something very similar as it was in CoDG and again I was disappointed, I remember being the player with more power among the 6 DPS as i remember being fifth in rank after 3 attempts, the first DPS a CW had twice my DPS. Right after I logged out of the game, I spent 10 days just logging in to get the VIP rewards and refining the AD. At this point in my more than 3 years of playing I knew that there was nothing I could improve, it was not me who was unable to make the content, the content was made for me not to do. I wonder how many good players like me from GWF or GF, DC and SW have been prevented from making ToMM. I was even more astonished when someone from the "friend list" asked me to change guild and join their alliance that they would carry me. Well, I’m still in the same guild, I don’t have the weapons for the Lion set and I’m going to try the new dungeon next week with my Burnish, because all I have left is the desire to move forward without the ambition to be where the better are.
I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
A possible solution could be, for every +X amount of AD donated (100,000 max) then +X more rAD that can be refined during that day. The Result would be, you can refine as much rAD as you donate.
Just a thought
The problem with that mechanism is that you're not really removing AD from the game. It's no longer a sink because you're taking some out, but allowing more to be refined.
What we could possibly do is allow AD donations, but also allow Unrefined AD donations.
If we allowed Unrefined AD to be donated to Strongholds, it prevents it from entering the economy in the first place.
I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
A possible solution could be, for every +X amount of AD donated (100,000 max) then +X more rAD that can be refined during that day. The Result would be, you can refine as much rAD as you donate.
Just a thought
The problem that mechanism is that you're not really removing AD from the game. It's no longer a sink because you're taking some out, but allowing more to be refined.
What we could possibly do is allow AD donations, but also allow Unrefined AD donations.
If we allowed Unrefined AD to be donated to Strongholds, it prevents it from entering the economy in the first place.
I know it's off topic, but last I checked there was over 18,000,000 zen in the backlog at 750 ad / zen. That's 750 * 18 * 10^6 = 13,500 * 10^6 (13,500,000,000), or over 13.5 billion ad sitting in the ZAX. The thing is, that AD gets sold to other players and doesn't leave the economy, if Cryptic/PWE was able/willing to, they could buy that AD themselves and remove 13 billion ad from the economy relatively simply. It would however result in an influx of Zen and devalue Wards and such. They could also slowly do this over the course of a given amount of time to alleviate the influx of Zen. How this would impact the economy in the long term, I have no clue, I don't know if 13 billion ad leaving the economy would be enough, or too much, or if their corporate side of things would even allow them to do it in the first place, but it would drain AD from the economy, and lower the Zax backlog at the same time.
Dealing with the overflow of AD in the PC economy is probably a discussion for another thread.
The only reason I could see in defending a stance in keeping the hardest content in the game available for fewer people is to maintain current status quo, and I doubt that is good for the game moving forward, as the current status quo is part of what got us to start discussing how to make the game better in the first place.
Is there anyone here actually defending that? Because what I see is @thefabricant saying "ToMM should have worthwhile exclusive rewards and Lionheart weapons are adequate for it" and others hearing "NO OTHER CONTENT SHOULD GIVE ANYTHING VALUABLE, THERE SHOULD BE NO ALTERNATIVES TO LIONHEART WHATSOEVER, PLEB".
I don't think anyone here is opposed to having alternate weapon sets, like Alabaster in M16 (required some expeditions), but the *best* gear should obviously be the one that requires more effort to get, like Burnished in M16 (required 4 weeks of LoMM).
ToMM having the best rewards exclusive to it is not a bad thing (just like Burnished was exclusive to LoMM in M16 and M17), the bad thing is the lack of any kind of progression between LoMM and ToMM after Burnished (except the AD farm, of course). I hope some ideas for gear progression in this CDP and the planned "tiered dungeons" from last CDP are used to create a less frustrating progression for all.
Apologies for the (extremely) long post. This is a subject I have a very strong opinion on, so I am breaking up my feedback into a general overview and then each sub section for readability purposes.
Table of Contents.
In order to quickly access any parts of my post, you can Control F and search for the following, just copy paste this text in to get that section.
✪ Part 1 – New Progression and Reward Paradigm.
✪ Part 2 – Boons Rework.
✪ Part 3 – Campaigns as optional content.
✪ Part 4 – Itemization Philosophy.
✪ Part 5 – Crafting.
✪ Part 6 – Chase Items.
✪ Part 7 – Slots in Items.
✪ Part 8 – Potential Implementation and Conclusion.
✪ Part 1 – New Progression and Reward Paradigm.
Feedback Overview.
Reworking the way character progression and rewards are structured internally, to have a consistent paradigm going forward both for item design and the rate at which player power progresses relative to content.
Feedback Goal.
Prevent unnecessary clashes between systems to prevent early forced obsolescence.
Allow for items to remain in a useable state for longer.
Allow for more interesting item design, whilst at the same time retaining a balanced endgame.
Allow for meaningful player choices in terms of item use.
Prevent unnecessary player frustration due to poor risk/reward ratios.
Allow for more horizontal rather than vertical progression.
Feedback Functionality.
Changing multiple systems in order to align them to a single progression/reward paradigm. This will be covered more in depth in each of the different areas my feedback addresses.
Risks and concerns.
Likely cannot be done in the short term, although small changes can be made to some systems to facilitate moving towards this later.
It makes item/reward design more predictable to the player. Depending on the developers aims, that may not be what you want.
Hi Fabricant,
First of all thank you very much for all the time you invested here and also for the formatting.
I actually agree with every single goal with the caveat of (and i am sure you are thinking this) still including vertical progression but in wider intervals.
Could you give an example in regard to this point please? 'Allow for meaningful player choices in terms of item use.'
Boons are the only long term reward a player obtains from campaigns. They play a role in character progression and are currently extremely lacklustre, while at the same time acting as a major chore for older players wanting to level up a new character. They also add up over time, leading to eventual power creep due to the way they are structured and the longer the game goes on, the more “catch up” a new player must do as a result of them.
Feedback Goal.
Change boons progression to horizontal rather than vertical, to help curb future power creep.
Make boons more meaningful and feel more impactful. Currently they are extremely lacklustre.
Bring back an element of player choice in character customization, by pitting meaningful boon choices against each other.
Make “alting” less of a chore, due to the reworked boon functionality.
Reduce the amount of catch up a new player must do.
Feedback Functionality.
Change the way campaign boons work, to make them similar to stronghold boons. Instead of allowing you to allocate additional points for every campaign you complete, you will always only be allowed to switch between 6 campaign boons. Two offensive, two defensive and two utility. Completing a campaign would then allow you to allocate points into that campaign’s boons and each campaign would add 1 new boon for each category. As the game goes on, there would be more and more choices to pick between, but the number of boons you could use would always be the same. This does the following:
Allows for more impactful boon choices. As the amount of power from boons is never intended to increase, you could aim for the overall impact of boons on a player to be, for example a 30% improvement so a player will really feel the impact of choosing a boon.
Allows for more innovative boon design. More powerful boons can do more interesting things.
Make campaigns less of a chore for older players. You only need to run through the campaigns for boons that you want. Also reduces the amount of catch up a new player needs to do.
Curbs power creep.
Risks and Concerns.
This type of horizontal progression necessitates that new boons not only be interesting, but also be situational, otherwise some campaigns will never be completed if their boons are considered to be a poor choice.
It is more difficult and time consuming to make powerful boons than make flat stat increases.
It necessitates recycling older mechanics, in order to provide incentive to sometimes switch between boons.
Many campaigns may never be ran as a result of this change if not implemented correctly.
Whilst I am 80 and 23k IL I really do not have a great understanding of the minutiae of Boons. A lot of this is due to the fact we need to streamline player flow and goals to 80 (see CDP 1 for those who haven't read it). Therefore this point is something that we are working toward refactoring 'Make campaigns less of a chore for older players. You only need to run through the campaigns for boons that you want. Also reduces the amount of catch up a new player needs to do.' I would just change OLDER to ALL.
I also like the idea of more horizontal progression elements in regard to abilities, boons and so on and again with the caveat that vertical progression isn't something we will ditch but at the same time Alternate Advancement can help slow the vertical power creep and make vertical progression more meaningful and relevant when it is released. I am a huge fan of Alternate Advancement personally.
I also very much like the idea of including more player agency in terms of boon choice. I need to learn more about and experience boons more deeply which I am doing at the moment and therefore I will dig into this specific area more in Phase 2 Fabricant.
Meeting now and then i will move onto your third post.
That [different ways to achieve bis gear] undermines the achievement of the people who beat ToMM and is strictly going against the idea of a good progression system. Not everyone needs to have every item and if they want the item, they should have to put in the work for it.
I can respect that opinion. However, it is one opinion among many other respectable opinions. Furthermore, "not everyone needs to have every item" is nothing that directly concerns you or your gameplay. Although I tend to agree (I personally don't need ToMM gear, because I am not interested in running the hardest dungeon available), I generally think one should be careful presiding over the needs of other players. However, love it when you are being constructive and focused on the health of the game for all players (which is most of the time)
noone cares that some casual players cant get the best endgame gear. Anyway, as long as you dont spend most of your time in leveling zones, helping new players understand and learn the game, you shouldnt be able to get any gear at all. Its people like you that let to the game beeing dumbed and borring.
A bit to aggressive for my taste. Also a little bit misleading. As far as I understand the discussion, most casual and semi-casual players (including players that have been bis at some point, but don't have the time to remain bis currently) are ok with the fact, that they cannot obtain the best endgame gear due to time constraints. What they would like, though, and I think that is a respectable opinion as well: - Have alternative ways to get gear that is not bis, but close enough to bis, so that they can play through all except the hardest content the way they like (e.g. with less challenge, e.g. "dumbed down and borring in your polite words)
Obviously, the "dumbed down" gear for the casual players needs to be obtainable within the time frame they can afford. As mentioned, it does not need to be endgame gear, but it should allow them to run through non-endgame dungeons, including the dungeon of the last mod, in a "more casual" way (e.g. the way they like to play the game).
Therefore, if we respect both opinions, of the bis-players and the casuals, the "dumbed down" gear needs to be better than the gear provided by the dungeon of the last mod, but inferior to the endgame gear provided by the dungeon of the current mod.
A bit agressiv maybe, but if u read what the person i replied to wrote, you will get it^^.
"Have alternative ways to get gear that is not bis, but close enough to bis, so that they can play through all except the hardest content the way they like"
That is perfectly reasonable, and noone is arguing against that. But there is a key difference between having easy to obtain "near BIS", or BIS gear. Alabaster and burnished weapons for example, are more then enough to beat all the content in this game, including ToMM. I guess as long as cryptic releases so little content every module, there will never be a point where all player groups could be satisfied, the gap between what we want is just way to big i suppose.
1
thefabricantMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 5,248Arc User
First of all thank you very much for all the time you invested here and also for the formatting.
I actually agree with every single goal with the caveat of (and i am sure you are thinking this) still including vertical progression but in wider intervals.
Could you give an example in regard to this point please? 'Allow for meaningful player choices in terms of item use.'
On to your next sections (-:
Chris
With regards to this, it has to do with the way itemization currently works in Neverwinter where there are very clear obvious choices in terms of what items a player at end game should be using. A lot of the choices that exist are "non choices" in the sense that yes you could use them, but you would be consciously deciding to use something worse in favour of a better option.
An easy example I can use, from a DPS players perspective is the Ebony Chest body armour, which increases your power by 10%. Sure, I could use something else as a DPS, but I would be choosing to use something which I know is worse. There isn't a real choice on that slot, I am "forced" into using 1 item.
Then in the cases where they are choices, they do not feel very meaningful. An example of this in module 17, there were boots and a shirt which had the same bonus (3% damage while above 75% stamina) and it did not stack, so these 2 items were mutually exclusive. You wanted this bonus on 1 of the items, but it did not matter which of the 2 it was on, so the choice existed did you pick the boots or did you pick the shirt. Now the problem here is, all the other boots and all the other shirts had poor effects, so you weren't forced into making an interesting decision here, you just picked whichever one's stats worked out right for you and that was it.
These problems are compounded by the fact that many of these bonuses are not interesting. Choosing to use a ring that increases the damage of your encounters by 3% or the damage of your at wills by 3% is not an interesting choice. It does not change the way you play the game, you will not even functionally notice the difference and the only way you will be able to tell you are performing 3% better is by sitting down and testing it.
To me, meaningful item choice means that there needs to be a moment of indecision when you are deciding what you want to use and right now, that indecision does not exist. I am not torn between picking item 1 and item 2. Part of the problem here is that item bonuses cannot, by the nature of how the system is currently designed, be particularly powerful, which limits you in terms of how interesting you can make the bonus. It is very difficult to do something interesting with a bonus which is supposed to improve your performance by at most 3%.
Anyhow, I am working on a (revised) version of my essay at the moment which I will share when I am done which covers a lot of the issues with my current essay, as well as I think explains my view a bit better, but its very long (over 13,000 words at the moment) so it is taking time to proof read and it covers more than just the scope of this CDP. I will link it when I am done.
Feedback Overview: A range of proposals on Masterwork Rewards
Feedback Goals: -To keep players interested and engaged in masterwork crafting and reducing the current 'feast or famine' approach. - To improve the sustainability of Masterwork as an element of Neverwinter - To improve 'quality of life' in masterwork tasks
Feedback functionality
Create distinction for Mastercrafted items; Make rewards that have distinct bonuses, set bonuses or allow the maker to create with distinct stats. These would make armour of interest to classes and distinguish them from each mods armour. An example could be to use 'off hand' weapon bonus options such as outgoing or incoming healing or stamina gain.
Increase the range of item rewards; consider new items such as companion gear, or jewels that increase one powers magnitude.
Allow for upgrades of masterwork items; others have already mentioned, make contingent on lengthy masterwork tasks. The benefit of this approach would be that masterwork remains relevant even when a new module doesnt have new masterwork recipes
Consider other rewards; consider masterwork tasks that allow for 'crafting chase items', for example 'legendary artisans, the ability to name your workshop or gain famous 'neverwinter/Faerun' NPC patrons (that could give small bonuses in crafting).
Create a range of Masterwork crafting options - from the basic levels to advanced and then legendary, mythic. Allow crafters to really focus on this aspect of the game. For example create chase crafting tasks that require tons of crafted materials or daily tending and have high risks of failure -but provide high rewards in terms of chase items.
Quality of life for mastercrafters; - Please increase the astral diamond limit to rush tasks - very tedious to keep going back to retainer - Please increase bag space for supplies or if this is not possible merge supplies with tools tab. - Please review tools so tool progression makes sense post mod 16 - example mythic forgehammer vs mod 16 tool.
Risks
Expense of masterwork may limit access or interest from new players Need to balance mod rewards with masterwork items and keep mod rewards important.
Feedback Goal: Allow old gear to be upgraded and retain some level of viability
Feedback Functionality: [...] is allowing older items [...] to upgrade to a higher tier, such as mythical or mythical +.
This raises the item level of the gear, it's base stats and it's unique effectiveness.
[...]
The further back the item was introduced, the more work will be involved in bringing said item up to it's max potential based upon the current meta.
So long as it's continually getting small but meaningful upgrades that the player needs to work for. And please don't bring into the foray something like Black Ice or Voninblod charging. No one liked that. Literally no one.
Very much like this idea.
However, its implementation will be challenging: - devs would have to update a huge number of items, for every new mod - even it the update process can be automated (only possible if every item is redesigned for automatic updates), the huge variety of different item boni probably require manual adjustments. - original idea probably needs to be "tuned down" a bit: Only increase item stats and damage for an upgrade, leaving the item boni untouched
The problem of limited development resources exists rather generally. I am certain, that the CDP will see many proposals, that the devs love in theory, but that cost too much manpower to implement - and probably more importantly: maintain - in practice.
In an earlier post, I outlined how Player Progression is directly affected by the health of the economy and access to things like wards, mount packs, etc.
To understand where this is coming from, Janne has an excellent overview on how the economy works: sheeho#6228 said:
Feedback Overview
In an earlier post, I outlined how Player Progression is directly affected by the health of the economy and access to things like wards, mount packs, etc.
The take away is that the game needs more AD sinks to skim currency out of the economy.
...snip...
I was in the middle of composing a reply to the VIP CDP at the very moment Chris closed it, with an alternative approach to this issue that kind of fit in with the VIP talk, and also "kind of" fits in with what we are talking about here.
My notion was to make VIP focused mainly on player benefits, or account based QoL improvements. But... also introduce a form of Character VIP. It wouldn't be called that, obviously, but on one of the live streams a week or two back Julia mentioned how Cryptic teams often exchange aspects of best practice, and one of the things that works well in STO that NWO has the ideal opportunity to use in its own way is Factions.
It is integral to STO, you are Federation, or Klingon, or whatever others they have, (I only play Federation and its been months since I last logged on...) but it could become an optional part of NW.
We have plenty of Factions to go at. Lords Alliance, Harpers, Zhentarim to name but a few.
How about a system where a player joins a Faction, and pays AD to get access to quests, gear, transmutes, and all manner of other stuff? Every month they pay, they advance a rank just like VIP. They get new quests, new perks, and maybe even Boons. Faction Gear would be only usable by members of that Faction, and it could spawn all sorts of events and missions. Guilds and Alliances could get involved, and have inter-factional mini games like Dragonflight. The Factions could be used as trading points to swap Resources needed for Guild Building
Example: of a Faction based Mini Event. The Race... Say you join the Zhentarim, and you get a message/quest asking you to take part in a Dungeon Raid to recover a special item from a crypt somewhere... (fill in plot as necessary) you queue for your team, and have to race against a team of Harpers coming from the other end of the dungeon to get the goodies first. At the end of the event, the Faction with the most successes get a reward (based on participation, of course) a bit like the Halloween thing with the three monster choices. 10 players. two groups of five working against each other without having actual PvP. (Though there is plenty of scope to do inter factional ACTUAL PvP.)
If you don't pay your fees for a month, you lose your standing in the Faction, and have as many months as you have ranks within it to re-start your payments before being booted. If you leave a Faction to join another, you start at the bottom again and lose access to the Faction Specific stuff you got.
This would be generally affordable for most players for one or two toons, but if we start getting into lots and lots of alts, then it's going to start costing a lot of money. The sort of money where AD starts to sink quite quickly.
(I don't pretend to know anywhere NEAR enough about the current economic metrics inside the game to begin to determine what would be a relative cost for this...)
I wish I hadn't lost that original post as it went into better detail about rewards and stuff, I could probably rewrite it, but this is just to offer a flavour of the idea.
There could even be a BIG reward for getting to rank 12. As (just with the Hell Pit) it would take a year to do this on one character, since you wouldn't be able to jump ranks, (even if you paid a full year up front... assuming that would even be allowed...) So you may be able to work for a year to get to the upper echelons of a Faction, completing quests ad task, and donating bits and pieces, and even gain a Legendary Mount. It would be harder work than Hell Pit, but ten times more enjoyable due to the variations available within the structure. Though there would have to be an account cap on something as big as Legendary Mounts, but maybe each faction has a Companion that is the dog's bollocks for specific classes or roles that could be gained by as many toons as you manage to run through to Rank 12.
Goal Progress as you wish at your own pace Allow a catch-up mechanism Make the game easier to understand Allows you to progress and play in several ways
functionality removal of the campaign time gating (allows you to catch up, to play at your own pace) (in the worst case, indicate in time how much currency you can spend in one week, but not how much you can acquire) Remove multiple currencies for the campaign Acquires campaign currency in several ways (The quest line, heroic encounters or mobs farming should give you currencies) (do what you like most) (AI campaign, there is no other way than the quest to acquire currency, several players we were frustrated to always do the same quest)
About the rewards:
Goal Make MODS more relevant longer Make the dungeon relevant forever
functionality Remove all gear from any dungeon reward (this is mainly why old dungeons are no longer relevant) Gear should drop from monsters or special quests (such as hunting, expedition) (This makes the MOD area relevant longer and more populated)
Time vs reward
Goal Make a reward proportional to the playing time
functionality The dungeon loot table reward should be adjusted based on the statistics you have on dungeon time to complete and make the ratio public. (dungeon x = 0.75 normal reward or 1.23 normal reward) (Adjust the sum of AD received and the quality of the objects accordingly with this parameter)
The loot table for all dungeons should be the same with the following difference.
The last dungeon obtains the last objects available in the game (ex: enchanting stone rank 6) until the arrival of new content Each dungeon has a higher chance on something (e.g. enchanted stone 3 for dungeon x) Weekly promo: this week, dungeon x has a better chance of dropping companions ... Remove gear Remove gear Please.. Remove gear
Please make all the content relevant, we don't need much more content if everything we currently have is useful.
First of all thank you very much for all the time you invested here and also for the formatting.
I actually agree with every single goal with the caveat of (and i am sure you are thinking this) still including vertical progression but in wider intervals.
Could you give an example in regard to this point please? 'Allow for meaningful player choices in terms of item use.'
On to your next sections (-:
Chris
With regards to this, it has to do with the way itemization currently works in Neverwinter where there are very clear obvious choices in terms of what items a player at end game should be using. A lot of the choices that exist are "non choices" in the sense that yes you could use them, but you would be consciously deciding to use something worse in favour of a better option.
An easy example I can use, from a DPS players perspective is the Ebony Chest body armour, which increases your power by 10%. Sure, I could use something else as a DPS, but I would be choosing to use something which I know is worse. There isn't a real choice on that slot, I am "forced" into using 1 item.
Then in the cases where they are choices, they do not feel very meaningful. An example of this in module 17, there were boots and a shirt which had the same bonus (3% damage while above 75% stamina) and it did not stack, so these 2 items were mutually exclusive. You wanted this bonus on 1 of the items, but it did not matter which of the 2 it was on, so the choice existed did you pick the boots or did you pick the shirt. Now the problem here is, all the other boots and all the other shirts had poor effects, so you weren't forced into making an interesting decision here, you just picked whichever one's stats worked out right for you and that was it.
These problems are compounded by the fact that many of these bonuses are not interesting. Choosing to use a ring that increases the damage of your encounters by 3% or the damage of your at wills by 3% is not an interesting choice. It does not change the way you play the game, you will not even functionally notice the difference and the only way you will be able to tell you are performing 3% better is by sitting down and testing it.
To me, meaningful item choice means that there needs to be a moment of indecision when you are deciding what you want to use and right now, that indecision does not exist. I am not torn between picking item 1 and item 2. Part of the problem here is that item bonuses cannot, by the nature of how the system is currently designed, be particularly powerful, which limits you in terms of how interesting you can make the bonus. It is very difficult to do something interesting with a bonus which is supposed to improve your performance by at most 3%.
Anyhow, I am working on a (revised) version of my essay at the moment which I will share when I am done which covers a lot of the issues with my current essay, as well as I think explains my view a bit better, but its very long (over 13,000 words at the moment) so it is taking time to proof read and it covers more than just the scope of this CDP. I will link it when I am done.
I would suggest waiting until I have been able to give my thoughts or your first design/commentary if that is ok for reasons of efficiency (should you want to include or respond or disagree with any thoughts I have currently on the original posts). It shouldn't take me more than a couple of hours.
And thanks for your explanation and giving more clarity there. Also it might be worth waiting until we enter phase 2 early next week to deploy your revised version so you can hear other ideas and comments from the CDP work group.
Chris
P.S: Phase 1 Ideation, Phase 2 Drilling into ideas and challenging/evolving them, Phase 3 Top 3 ideas and why.
Comments
Alternative sets that are comparable don't undermine the achievement of acquiring the absolute BIS set, just like Alabaster and Mountaineer sets didn't undermine the achievement of getting Burnished weapons. The Alabaster set wasn't absolutely BiS, and they didn't have the same bragging rights that Burnished had, but they were comparable, and a skilled player with Alabaster, could out dps someone with Burnished. Having Burnished weapons didn't give anyone such a significant advantage that Lionheart does right now.
Feedback Goal: Allow old gear to be upgraded and retain some level of viability
Feedback Functionality: With each module, new gear is released and new content is introduced. But as many, many others have pointed out, there's a large swath of us who either do not have the means to complete the content due to player restrictions (lots and lots of scrolls) or IL requirements that are much greater than what Cryptic has envisioned.
In order to help curb this and potentially introduce a facet into the game that you guys may or may not have considered is allowing older items, whether they be artifacts, weapons, neck or belt pieces the opportunity to upgrade to a higher tier, such as mythical or mythical +.
This raises the item level of the gear, it's base stats and it's unique effectiveness. For instance, lets say that the newest campaign has released item level 1250 (which they just did) piece, which is great but the effects of the item are not desirable or you simply cannot acquire the item due to whatever circumstances hinder you.
Allow for an older item, let's use the weapons from River District/Cloaked Ascendancy for example, to be upgraded to mythical and be shy of the best weapons currently in the game, the Lionheart set. Maybe even have them be a smidge behind Alabaster and the others introduced in mod 16. I'll provide a quick example.
Current stats of a legendary Aboleth Greatsword:
Item Level: 675
2437-2978 damage
+540 Combined Rating
+6480 Power
+675 Critical Strike
+675 Accuracy
+1350 Combat Advantage
When you use an encounter power, you will become Far-Influenced, which increases your Outgoing Damage by 4% and grants you a random buff for 10 seconds.
Relentless — Increases your Critical Strike by 2500.
Tainted Attack — Enemies you attack will take additional damage over time.
Impeding Death — Enemies you attack will explode on death, doing damage to other foes.
You can only be Far-Influenced once every 30 seconds.
The current stats of the Lionheart Greatsword is as follows:
Item Level: 1,010
3,643-4,452 Damage
+808 Combined Rating
+9,696 Power
+2,020 Armor Penetration
+2,020 Accuracy
Increases damage dealt and outgoing healing by up to 10% whenever your Stamina is full. Effect decreases as Stamina decreases. Decreases damage received by up to 10% whenever your Stamina is empty. Effect decreases as Stamina is increases.
Now, there's a rather healthy gap presented here and while this may be a bit of a stretch as an example, it should still serve to state the intent. If you guys introduced a legacy quest that had the player revisit old campaigns, to whatever reasonable extent you guys deem necessary for whatever piece of equipment they hope to do this with, they can raise the Aboleth Greatsword in this example, to mythical levels.
The end result of this will be (super rough example basing it off of the current Alabaster set with some modifications)
Item Level: 970
Aboleth Greatsword +7
3,655-4,220 Damage
+775 Combined Rating
+9,350 Power
+1,850 Critical Strike
+1,850 Accuracy
+2525 Combat Advantage
When you use an encounter power, you will become Far-Influenced, which increases your Outgoing Damage by 5% and grants you a random buff for 15 seconds.
Relentless — Increases your Critical Strike by 2500 and Critical Severity by 3%.
Tainted Attack — Enemies you attack will take 20/30/40 magnitude weapon damage over time from your attacks.
Impeding Death — Enemies you attack will explode on death, doing damage to other foes. The damage lingers and burns surrounding foes for 120% weapon damage over 3 seconds.
You can only be Far-Influenced once every 15 seconds.
Yes, I know that I have it's duration and it's activation on the same timer of 15 seconds. Consider it to be a rotating buff that will keep itself going so long as encounters can flow with a 15 second rotation. Akin to the old Feytouched enchantment. Now, with this, the old Aboleth Greatsword is still viable but may not be as desirable as the current weapons. It's still doing less peak damage than both the Alabaster and Lionheart set yet, it has features that might make it desirable for players to continue to use without feeling left behind or no longer using the items they like. Also, I raised it's base damage but reduced it's peak damage. So average damage won't be impacted as hard. But huge single hits will not be able to reach the levels of Alabaster or Lionheart.
With each mod introduction that brings about new items that would make the old obsolete, introduce a new legacy quest in the old module that would allow for another incremental increase. You could literally have it look something like this.
Mythical:
Lostmauth's Hoard Necklace +1
Lostmauth's Hoard Necklace +2
Lostmauth's Hoard Necklace +3
etc., etc.
The further back the item was introduced, the more work will be involved in bringing said item up to it's max potential based upon the current meta.
So long as it's continually getting small but meaningful upgrades that the player needs to work for. And please don't bring into the foray something like Black Ice or Voninblod charging. No one liked that. Literally no one.
Folks may be more inclined to go through older content if they know they can keep certain pieces of their equipment viable for longer. Keep a really close eye on items that may cause an imbalance on your design and goals, such as the recently nerfed Demogorgon set.
Nonetheless, I don't think anyone would be opposed to this idea. I also HIGHLY encourage you guys to consider doing something similar to this for gear. Use seals, use whatever currency you like but, allow there to be legendary helms, chest, arms and leg pieces already. Utilizing this same technique, you can appease a whole swath of players who are livid that the gear that they worked so hard for is now obsolete and allows for a much greater variance than the current cookie cutter gear sets you see all over the place today. If you guys don't want to do that, that's fine but, the upgradable artifacts absolutely should be able to be upgraded in such a fashion.
Risks & Concerns: This could reduce the desirability of newly introduced items to a marginal degree. The sense of rush needed to push through the new content may not be as prevalent and may in turn allow the module more dwell time. The new items should always be of a higher item level and higher base stats than the old items fully upgraded. Obviously the above is just an example and I leave you guys to determine the formula necessary to pull this off without hindering your design intentions going forward. Someone in the latest and greatest gear will still be technically capable of more but, it'll help close the gap; even if it's just marginal.
> (Quote)
> They should have made the ToMM weapons unbound, that would adress your point right? No need for other ways of getting them, since u can do what u want, and buy them with the AD you earn.
Right. As it was for Castle Never weapons. Obviously they would have a very high price on the auction as Castle Never weapons had
Born of Black Wind: SW Level 80
You do not need lionheart weapons to beat any of the content in the game. The best items, should come from the hardest content. If equivalent items dropped from easier content then there would be no reason to run ToMM.
Yes, there is no reason to run ToMM. There is no reason to run Cloak Tower either but it still pops up in the que... ToMM is such a small part of the game and very few people do it. You say that since few can do it, that ToMM should have the best rewards. I just disagree, that's all. Since so few people do it why give it any love at all?
And since you don't need lionheart to beat any of the game, why gatekeep it in ToMM at all?
Feedback Overview
In an earlier post, I outlined how Player Progression is directly affected by the health of the economy and access to things like wards, mount packs, etc.To understand where this is coming from, Janne has an excellent overview on how the economy works: https://guides.jannenw.info/2020/01/29/neverwinter-basics-economy/
The take away is that the game needs more AD sinks to skim currency out of the economy.
What's the problem with the economy?
The PC ZAX exchange has been backlogged for a long time. To convert your AD to Zen tends to take a month or more. - This means the economy is static.A static economy stunts player progression and leaves the marketplace ripe for abuse.
Example: Pres Wards are hugely important for a player to upgrade their character. On console the market is fluid. If any one person tries to monopolize pres wards and inflate the price, other players will react by slightly undercutting him. This keeps the price stable. They can do this because any player can buy pres wards by converting AD to Zen almost immediately. ... The market self-corrects.
In a static market like PC, things are different. One rich player or group of players can monopolize pres wards and inflate the price. Other players can react, but not until they can buy more zen. Because the backlog is so long, the market will be extremely slow to correct, leaving the monopoly intact for a long period of time.
^ This is why the backlog is so bad for player progression. It leaves item prices ultra-high and slows players ability to improve. Lack of improvements leave players bored because their progression is stunted.
Consoles are not immune either. The PS4 market is the youngest, has more swings, and still caps-out at times.
The Xbox market is the healthiest, but I've been playing for 2 years and can see it creeping up. When I first started playing, the ZAX hovered at 500, now it hovers around 550. Not a huge change, but it is creeping up slowly.
---
Feedback Goal
We need more AD Sinks to normalize the economy.---
Feedback Functionality
Add a Lottery
I'm thinking like a wheel you can spin to get rewards. Pay a set amount of AD for a spin. Drops should be something like lockboxes.Why is the Lottery different than Lockboxes?
Lockboxes require Enchanted Keys, which you can only get from the Zen store. If the ZAX is backlogged, keys are out of reach. The Lottery removes AD from the economy without needing the exchange.
Risks & Concerns:
Drops should be regulated so they don't flood the makertplace with rare items. Although, I doubt that would be a terrible negative. As long as there's lots of AD coming out of the economy, it's an overall positive.
--
Add a ZAX Tax
There would be no tax on buying AD with Zen, but buying Zen with AD would have a 1-10% tax. This will constently drain AD out of the economy.You could also vary the tax based on the health of the platform, for example; Xbox may only have a 1-2% tax, but PC with the worse economy may have a 5-10% tax.
Risks & Concerns:
Players would be mad. Most players don't understand how the economy works and wuold see it as a negative. But no real-world exchange works without some kind of fee.
Players may be hesitant to buy AD if they know they'll get taxed on the way back when buying Zen again.
I'm not sure that's a negative though. If players hold their investment in Zen, it's still a form of limiting how much currency is in the economy.
--
Reinstate the AH Fee for VIP Players
VIP players can game the AH by pulling listings down freely and reposting. AH Fees should be required, aka your listing fee gets paid when you post. If the items sells, you get the fee back. If the listing runs out of time, you get the fee back. But if you pull a listing down early, you lose the fee.I would also suggest Listings stay up for 7 days instead of 5 days. Players can still play the market, but they need to account for the cost if they want to take listings down early.
Risks & Concerns:
VIP players will be mad, but overall it will be good for the game.
--
Player Housing
Yes, I know the devs have said they don't want to do player housing, but I think it could be managed.First Idea:
Add extra rooms or another floor to the Workshop. The instance is already designed to be upgradable.
Remember Skyrim houses? You have a vendor which allows you to buy rooms, buy furniture, maybe have different decoration sets you can buy. It's all purchasable with AD. You want the Halloween kitchen? Knock yourself out. You want the Bridal bedroom suite? Buy it from the vendor.
Cons: Players can't invite other players to the instance.
Second Idea:
An instance with a farm that has steep AD requirements to buy, upgrade, and maintain.
Similar in functionality to the Stronghold, you can invite other players if you want. The farm requires AD to decorate it, buy livestock, add rooms, etc.
The farm requires AD to maintain it or it goes into disrepair.
Why would you want the farm beyond decoration? Maybe there's a minidungeon at the back of the property? Maybe there's a storyline the same way the Stronghold has?
In another post I suggested a randomized mini-dungeon system like ME's. I think this would be a perfect place for something like that.
Players can invite other players to their house instance.
Cons:
devs have made it clear that the server can't support tons of new instances.
The solution is to make this feature very expensive.
I'm thinking at least 10 million AD just to get access to the property, then you need more AD to build the structure and follow the questline. The end-goal being that they have access to a mini-dungeon at the end. The instance needs constant maintanence cost. If they don't keep up with it, they lose access to the mini-dungeon and the property starts to fall into disrepair.
--
More AD Sink to Strongholds
Strongholds have an AD Donation thing already. I think that should be a much larger part of the requirements. Strongholds could use an update anyway.Risks & Concerns:
I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
--
Buy Dungeon Chest Keys with AD
You don't want to grind Chult again to get chest keys? Allow keys to be purchased with AD.Honeslty, if players have finished a campaign, the last thing they want to go is grind through it again for chest keys. Give them an option where they can be bought with AD.
Risks & Concerns:
Players could stockpile keys and run dungeons repeatedly during 2X events — However, they do this already.
It should encourage players to spend more time in dungeons and it's removing AD from the game.
--
Add Old Fashion and Appearance Items to an AD Store
You have lots of old gear that's only really useful as appearance items, but it's scattered all over the place. Why not put it in one store and let players shop it using AD?Risks & Concerns:
I guess just the time it takes to build the store. Otherwise it seems like a no-brainer.
--
Health Stones / Life Scrolls Purchasable with AD
First off, I'd say both Health Stones and Scrolls are far too easy to get. These are valuable items that should be at a premium. As it stands now, players consume them at an alarming rate. They are a handycap that promotes poor gameplay.They should be removed from other sources and instead be purchasable from a normal vendor for Ad. Cost should be controlled so they are somewhat expensive.
---
Those are my thoughts.
I very much think the economy is an important part of Neverwinter. To a large extent it is a game within a game. Some players spend lots of time just combing the AH for profits and finding ways to earn currencies.
It's also integral to player's continued progression.
You also have to consider that if Neverwinter gets more popular, more active players = more AD in the economy. You'll need more ways to skim AD out to keep the economy healthy.
Designing a game around the lowest common denominator is a quick way to kill it, as anyone who would form a part of the core community of a game would quickly lose interest and move on and then all the new players who come wondering in would have no community to engage with.
People need to learn to accept that not every piece of content (this includes items) in the game is designed for every player. You don't see me campaigning for the removal of PVP, despite the fact that I have no interest in playing it.
Furthermore, "not everyone needs to have every item" is nothing that directly concerns you or your gameplay.
Although I tend to agree (I personally don't need ToMM gear, because I am not interested in running the hardest dungeon available), I generally think one should be careful presiding over the needs of other players.
However, love it when you are being constructive and focused on the health of the game for all players (which is most of the time) A bit to aggressive for my taste.
Also a little bit misleading.
As far as I understand the discussion, most casual and semi-casual players (including players that have been bis at some point, but don't have the time to remain bis currently) are ok with the fact, that they cannot obtain the best endgame gear due to time constraints. What they would like, though, and I think that is a respectable opinion as well:
- Have alternative ways to get gear that is not bis, but close enough to bis, so that they can play through all except the hardest content the way they like (e.g. with less challenge, e.g. "dumbed down and bor
ring in your polite words)Obviously, the "dumbed down" gear for the casual players needs to be obtainable within the time frame they can afford.
As mentioned, it does not need to be endgame gear, but it should allow them to run through non-endgame dungeons, including the dungeon of the last mod, in a "more casual" way (e.g. the way they like to play the game).
Therefore, if we respect both opinions, of the bis-players and the casuals, the "dumbed down" gear needs to be better than the gear provided by the dungeon of the last mod, but inferior to the endgame gear provided by the dungeon of the current mod.
Upgrading enchantments/runestones is an important part of character progession in Neverwinter after you get the gear that's been labeled "BiS" by the community. The level of runestones and enchantments rewarded have been increased from lockboxes so I believe it would be reasonable to allow at least the epic quality refining stones to drop at the rate of the ES6 current rate (competing with the rank 6 would likely increase the value of those)
Personally, if I had the refining stones more often enough for an upgrade, I'd be more willing to buy wards for the attempt. These days I just often wait for 2x stones and/or Bazaar sales which stagnates (some) progression.
Yes, there is no reason to run ToMM. There is no reason to run Cloak Tower either but it still pops up in the que... ToMM is such a small part of the game and very few people do it. You say that since few can do it, that ToMM should have the best rewards. I just disagree, that's all. Since so few people do it why give it any love at all?
And since you don't need lionheart to beat any of the game, why gatekeep it in ToMM at all?
The correct aprouch here would be the weapons to be unbound, so the top players could make some ad and low equipped player would have the options to put ad on it...
I personally think mostly would have much mroe powerup investing in Runes and enchants but there is people that would buy it...
For Brag rights it should give a Title, or a Skin (for weapon or armor or even a mount skin...) i believe each dungeon should have at least 1 unique "skin gift" in the first comletion...
Risks & Concerns:
I guess players could complain that thier individual AD is limited by the refinement cap. Guilds are where lots of players should be active though, so it's more of a group investment than an individual investment.
A possible solution could be, for every +X amount of AD donated (100,000 max) then +X more rAD that can be refined during that day. The Result would be, you can refine as much rAD as you donate.
Just a thought
Yeah, that is - not surprisingly - on the wishlist of the "top players".
Making "some ad" is perfectly fine with me.
However, there is some duplicity in such a wish and there could be risks for the overall health of the game:
- it somewhat defeats the frequently voiced argument (often by the same top players), that bis gear "needs to be earned", "needs to be worked for"
- buying bis gear with AD is "pay to win", generally despised by most players (including those that sell stuff for profit)
- if prices are too high, the funds of the players scrambling to the top will become depleted and at the same time the coffers of the top players will overflow. This will tend to increase the gap between top players and players trying to chase to the top. This could affect the long-term health of the game, in particular if the top content is extremely hard (ToMM), so that only a small percentage has a chance at completing it.
For the above mentioned reason(s) I personally would prefer, that bis gear remains bound (to account).
Non-bis gear (for instance of the dungeon of the last mod), which is easier to obtain and therefore will not sell at outrageous prices, can be non-bound. Still somewhat ptw ....
Introducing alternative weapon sets that are comparable to Lionheart weapons, albeit with different bonuses that would not be BiS for the meta, would not deter people from gaining enjoyment from running the hardest or easiest content in the game. In fact, it would open the doors for more people to partake in that enjoyment. Most groups wont accept people if they think that player would make the chance at success worse, or harder than they deem fit. Having alternative sets would increase the effectiveness of players who have not acquired Lionheart weaps yet (replace with X, Y, Z for future difficult content), and as a result increase the number of players who could then run ToMM and use the alternatives as stepping stones to get the BiS item. This is exactly how Alabaster weapons were treated by many, others stuck with Alabaster as they didn't see a need to spend resources to upgrade further being satisfied with what they had, and there's nothing wrong with that, it didn't stop them from running LoMM.
The only reason I could see in defending a stance in keeping the hardest content in the game available for fewer people is to maintain current status quo, and I doubt that is good for the game moving forward, as the current status quo is part of what got us to start discussing how to make the game better in the first place.
And most of the rest are annoyed by the rewards being locked away out of their reach.
Think that sums it up well enough for us to move on?
As this is within the theme, I will talk about something that is very comprehensive. When a new Dungeon or Trial is completed, it is a reward, as all your effort is directed towards this content. Wow how happy I was when I completed my first CN, FBI, MSP, MSVA, ToNG, CoDG and CR. At that time it was something that my emotions oscillated a lot, because when I failed I knew that I would have to go after improving my equipment and even frustrated I still had the desire to reach my goal, which made me evolve. At that time it was much more difficult to be a DPS than it is today. I ran CoDG myself enough to upgrade weapons. I didn't feel comfortable doing something that if I died, I was able to make the other 9 fail. When META was Buffs / Debuffs, there was a lot of that, there were 4 other players playing for you. I was the one who took the sword vs Strahd Von Zarovich, and I was responsible for ensuring that there was no flaw in the mechanics of permadeath.
Mod 16 came, the change module. In the first few weeks of LoMM, I already knew that I would not run, always the elite players that many of them tested were going to go. In the following weeks I will take a chance and find out from my own exp (I had read in the forums or in the game chats) that my DPS class was weak and that there were better options. It discouraged me, I had a lot more equipment than many who were finishing there. Launches ToMM, changes to the DPS formula that excited me again and as it is a Trial, you join groups for Training, something very similar as it was in CoDG and again I was disappointed, I remember being the player with more power among the 6 DPS as i remember being fifth in rank after 3 attempts, the first DPS a CW had twice my DPS. Right after I logged out of the game, I spent 10 days just logging in to get the VIP rewards and refining the AD. At this point in my more than 3 years of playing I knew that there was nothing I could improve, it was not me who was unable to make the content, the content was made for me not to do. I wonder how many good players like me from GWF or GF, DC and SW have been prevented from making ToMM. I was even more astonished when someone from the "friend list" asked me to change guild and join their alliance that they would carry me. Well, I’m still in the same guild, I don’t have the weapons for the Lion set and I’m going to try the new dungeon next week with my Burnish, because all I have left is the desire to move forward without the ambition to be where the better are.
What we could possibly do is allow AD donations, but also allow Unrefined AD donations.
If we allowed Unrefined AD to be donated to Strongholds, it prevents it from entering the economy in the first place.
Dealing with the overflow of AD in the PC economy is probably a discussion for another thread.
I don't think anyone here is opposed to having alternate weapon sets, like Alabaster in M16 (required some expeditions), but the *best* gear should obviously be the one that requires more effort to get, like Burnished in M16 (required 4 weeks of LoMM).
ToMM having the best rewards exclusive to it is not a bad thing (just like Burnished was exclusive to LoMM in M16 and M17), the bad thing is the lack of any kind of progression between LoMM and ToMM after Burnished (except the AD farm, of course). I hope some ideas for gear progression in this CDP and the planned "tiered dungeons" from last CDP are used to create a less frustrating progression for all.
First of all thank you very much for all the time you invested here and also for the formatting.
I actually agree with every single goal with the caveat of (and i am sure you are thinking this) still including vertical progression but in wider intervals.
Could you give an example in regard to this point please? 'Allow for meaningful player choices in terms of item use.'
On to your next sections (-:
Chris
@What we could possibly do is allow AD donations, but also allow Unrefined AD donations.”
Yes that’s a better and simpler way. I agree
Cheers
I also like the idea of more horizontal progression elements in regard to abilities, boons and so on and again with the caveat that vertical progression isn't something we will ditch but at the same time Alternate Advancement can help slow the vertical power creep and make vertical progression more meaningful and relevant when it is released. I am a huge fan of Alternate Advancement personally.
I also very much like the idea of including more player agency in terms of boon choice. I need to learn more about and experience boons more deeply which I am doing at the moment and therefore I will dig into this specific area more in Phase 2 Fabricant.
Meeting now and then i will move onto your third post.
Chris
"Have alternative ways to get gear that is not bis, but close enough to bis, so that they can play through all except the hardest content the way they like"
That is perfectly reasonable, and noone is arguing against that. But there is a key difference between having easy to obtain "near BIS", or BIS gear. Alabaster and burnished weapons for example, are more then enough to beat all the content in this game, including ToMM. I guess as long as cryptic releases so little content every module, there will never be a point where all player groups could be satisfied, the gap between what we want is just way to big i suppose.
An easy example I can use, from a DPS players perspective is the Ebony Chest body armour, which increases your power by 10%. Sure, I could use something else as a DPS, but I would be choosing to use something which I know is worse. There isn't a real choice on that slot, I am "forced" into using 1 item.
Then in the cases where they are choices, they do not feel very meaningful. An example of this in module 17, there were boots and a shirt which had the same bonus (3% damage while above 75% stamina) and it did not stack, so these 2 items were mutually exclusive. You wanted this bonus on 1 of the items, but it did not matter which of the 2 it was on, so the choice existed did you pick the boots or did you pick the shirt. Now the problem here is, all the other boots and all the other shirts had poor effects, so you weren't forced into making an interesting decision here, you just picked whichever one's stats worked out right for you and that was it.
These problems are compounded by the fact that many of these bonuses are not interesting. Choosing to use a ring that increases the damage of your encounters by 3% or the damage of your at wills by 3% is not an interesting choice. It does not change the way you play the game, you will not even functionally notice the difference and the only way you will be able to tell you are performing 3% better is by sitting down and testing it.
To me, meaningful item choice means that there needs to be a moment of indecision when you are deciding what you want to use and right now, that indecision does not exist. I am not torn between picking item 1 and item 2. Part of the problem here is that item bonuses cannot, by the nature of how the system is currently designed, be particularly powerful, which limits you in terms of how interesting you can make the bonus. It is very difficult to do something interesting with a bonus which is supposed to improve your performance by at most 3%.
Anyhow, I am working on a (revised) version of my essay at the moment which I will share when I am done which covers a lot of the issues with my current essay, as well as I think explains my view a bit better, but its very long (over 13,000 words at the moment) so it is taking time to proof read and it covers more than just the scope of this CDP. I will link it when I am done.
Feedback Goals:
-To keep players interested and engaged in masterwork crafting and reducing the current 'feast or famine' approach.
- To improve the sustainability of Masterwork as an element of Neverwinter
- To improve 'quality of life' in masterwork tasks
Feedback functionality
Create distinction for Mastercrafted items; Make rewards that have distinct bonuses, set bonuses or allow the maker to create with distinct stats. These would make armour of interest to classes and distinguish them from each mods armour. An example could be to use 'off hand' weapon bonus options such as outgoing or incoming healing or stamina gain.
Increase the range of item rewards; consider new items such as companion gear, or jewels that increase one powers magnitude.
Allow for upgrades of masterwork items; others have already mentioned, make contingent on lengthy masterwork tasks. The benefit of this approach would be that masterwork remains relevant even when a new module doesnt have new masterwork recipes
Consider other rewards; consider masterwork tasks that allow for 'crafting chase items', for example 'legendary artisans, the ability to name your workshop or gain famous 'neverwinter/Faerun' NPC patrons (that could give small bonuses in crafting).
Create a range of Masterwork crafting options - from the basic levels to advanced and then legendary, mythic. Allow crafters to really focus on this aspect of the game. For example create chase crafting tasks that require tons of crafted materials or daily tending and have high risks of failure -but provide high rewards in terms of chase items.
Quality of life for mastercrafters;
- Please increase the astral diamond limit to rush tasks - very tedious to keep going back to retainer
- Please increase bag space for supplies or if this is not possible merge supplies with tools tab.
- Please review tools so tool progression makes sense post mod 16 - example mythic forgehammer vs mod 16 tool.
Risks
Expense of masterwork may limit access or interest from new players
Need to balance mod rewards with masterwork items and keep mod rewards important.
Some Archers are Imaginary...
However, its implementation will be challenging:
- devs would have to update a huge number of items, for every new mod
- even it the update process can be automated (only possible if every item is redesigned for automatic updates), the huge variety of different item boni probably require manual adjustments.
- original idea probably needs to be "tuned down" a bit: Only increase item stats and damage for an upgrade, leaving the item boni untouched
The problem of limited development resources exists rather generally.
I am certain, that the CDP will see many proposals, that the devs love in theory, but that cost too much manpower to implement - and probably more importantly: maintain - in practice.
My notion was to make VIP focused mainly on player benefits, or account based QoL improvements.
But... also introduce a form of Character VIP. It wouldn't be called that, obviously, but on one of the live streams a week or two back Julia mentioned how Cryptic teams often exchange aspects of best practice, and one of the things that works well in STO that NWO has the ideal opportunity to use in its own way is Factions.
It is integral to STO, you are Federation, or Klingon, or whatever others they have, (I only play Federation and its been months since I last logged on...) but it could become an optional part of NW.
We have plenty of Factions to go at.
Lords Alliance, Harpers, Zhentarim to name but a few.
How about a system where a player joins a Faction, and pays AD to get access to quests, gear, transmutes, and all manner of other stuff? Every month they pay, they advance a rank just like VIP. They get new quests, new perks, and maybe even Boons. Faction Gear would be only usable by members of that Faction, and it could spawn all sorts of events and missions. Guilds and Alliances could get involved, and have inter-factional mini games like Dragonflight. The Factions could be used as trading points to swap Resources needed for Guild Building
Example: of a Faction based Mini Event.
The Race...
Say you join the Zhentarim, and you get a message/quest asking you to take part in a Dungeon Raid to recover a special item from a crypt somewhere... (fill in plot as necessary) you queue for your team, and have to race against a team of Harpers coming from the other end of the dungeon to get the goodies first.
At the end of the event, the Faction with the most successes get a reward (based on participation, of course) a bit like the Halloween thing with the three monster choices.
10 players. two groups of five working against each other without having actual PvP.
(Though there is plenty of scope to do inter factional ACTUAL PvP.)
If you don't pay your fees for a month, you lose your standing in the Faction, and have as many months as you have ranks within it to re-start your payments before being booted. If you leave a Faction to join another, you start at the bottom again and lose access to the Faction Specific stuff you got.
This would be generally affordable for most players for one or two toons, but if we start getting into lots and lots of alts, then it's going to start costing a lot of money. The sort of money where AD starts to sink quite quickly.
(I don't pretend to know anywhere NEAR enough about the current economic metrics inside the game to begin to determine what would be a relative cost for this...)
I wish I hadn't lost that original post as it went into better detail about rewards and stuff, I could probably rewrite it, but this is just to offer a flavour of the idea.
There could even be a BIG reward for getting to rank 12. As (just with the Hell Pit) it would take a year to do this on one character, since you wouldn't be able to jump ranks, (even if you paid a full year up front... assuming that would even be allowed...) So you may be able to work for a year to get to the upper echelons of a Faction, completing quests ad task, and donating bits and pieces, and even gain a Legendary Mount.
It would be harder work than Hell Pit, but ten times more enjoyable due to the variations available within the structure. Though there would have to be an account cap on something as big as Legendary Mounts, but maybe each faction has a Companion that is the dog's bollocks for specific classes or roles that could be gained by as many toons as you manage to run through to Rank 12.
About progression:
Goal
Progress as you wish at your own pace
Allow a catch-up mechanism
Make the game easier to understand
Allows you to progress and play in several ways
functionality
removal of the campaign time gating (allows you to catch up, to play at your own pace)
(in the worst case, indicate in time how much currency you can spend in one week, but not how much you can acquire)
Remove multiple currencies for the campaign
Acquires campaign currency in several ways
(The quest line, heroic encounters or mobs farming should give you currencies) (do what you like most) (AI campaign, there is no other way than the quest to acquire currency, several players we were frustrated to always do the same quest)
About the rewards:
Goal
Make MODS more relevant longer
Make the dungeon relevant forever
functionality
Remove all gear from any dungeon reward (this is mainly why old dungeons are no longer relevant)
Gear should drop from monsters or special quests (such as hunting, expedition)
(This makes the MOD area relevant longer and more populated)
Time vs reward
Goal
Make a reward proportional to the playing time
functionality
The dungeon loot table reward should be adjusted based on the statistics you have on dungeon time to complete and make the ratio public.
(dungeon x = 0.75 normal reward or 1.23 normal reward)
(Adjust the sum of AD received and the quality of the objects accordingly with this parameter)
The loot table for all dungeons should be the same with the following difference.
The last dungeon obtains the last objects available in the game (ex: enchanting stone rank 6) until the arrival of new content
Each dungeon has a higher chance on something (e.g. enchanted stone 3 for dungeon x)
Weekly promo: this week, dungeon x has a better chance of dropping companions ...
Remove gear
Remove gear
Please..
Remove gear
Please make all the content relevant, we don't need much more content if everything we currently have is useful.
And thanks for your explanation and giving more clarity there. Also it might be worth waiting until we enter phase 2 early next week to deploy your revised version so you can hear other ideas and comments from the CDP work group.
Chris
P.S: Phase 1 Ideation, Phase 2 Drilling into ideas and challenging/evolving them, Phase 3 Top 3 ideas and why.