I'm not suggesting that characters just be given the gear that they want. I think there's a happy medium that preserves the excitement of earning equipment through player achievements without requiring grinding... for instance, some MMORPGs have elite bosses that drop rare equipment, but only like 1% of the time... so you could end up having to fight those bosses hundreds of times and never see a drop. After achieving, say, 5-10 wins in a row vs. the boss, you've demonstrated that you've mastered the challenge, so you deserve the reward. Frankly, I think it's more fair if the boss drops the item every time you beat him. After all, you won, right? Shouldn't that mean something? Worse still, you're sometimes expected to sit around waiting for these bosses to randomly spawn once every few days, often to see some other group of players get the fight. Expecting players to repeat the same fight for years just to make the dropped item super rare seems pretty sadistic to me, and I won't tolerate that BS.
I should have clarified my statement about the self-grandizing. Wasn't pointed at any specific person here. More to the over all attitude that has been creeping in to the player base in the past few years. My apologies if anyone took it otherwise.
You touched on what many of us have been saying for several years, since EQ in my case. When running through a PnP campaign, unless it is a recurring villain, how many times do you get to beat an enemy & plunder his riches? As much as I was enthralled by EQ & many of it's progeny (OMG what do you mean WoW wasn't the first MMO? :eek:), there always was & always will be, unless we can all find a better solution, a grind aspect. If players only had to kill a Boss once, the Devs would have to pump out new content every week. There has to be a happy medium or better way.
If players only had to kill a Boss once, the Devs would have to pump out new content every week. There has to be a happy medium or better way.
Hopefully, the Foundry will mitigate this problem. Although, if a boss fight is fun, I like to repeat it just because it is fun. I don't need to be taunted by gear for that.
As for weapons in a D&D context, magic weapons for a L 1 character should be rare with a level 4 or 5 magic item (basing this on tabletop) being the absolute maximum one should realistically get as a L1 PC (l6 and up +2 or higher tier enchantments.) Whatever the maximum level (based on 60 levels for 20 tabletop so estimating 90 absolute if epic is ever used so it can be ported in) a character should start with a +1 when applicable in attack/defense and it should only go up or be available almost all of the time after fifteen levels. This is following the maximum enchantment of +6 per D&D 4E, but the ratio should be the same (tabletop base of 5:1 or online game of 15:1 based on six enhancement tiers from +1 to +6 but adjusted accordingly if the game goes higher enhancement which is definitely not recommended to stop power creep.)
Yeah, level 1 characters should be using mundane equipment or there's no reason for it to exist. DDO is definitely a "high magic" campaign as far as item drops are concerned (which isn't such a bad thing considering it means the terrible crafting system can be ignored).
When DDO first started if you were really lucky you could possibly pull a +1 weapon by the time you were level 2. IF you hit a rare in the Cartamon quests (level 2 quest) you had a very small chance of pulling an acid touched short sword (1 pt of acid per hit). It was the first glowing weapon you could possibly get. The game played just like D&D and was quite fun.
What happened is that as players leveled up and started doing higher level quests they were pulling flaming swords, etc. that were ML 4 or so. These weapons got passed down to twink the next character for that player. Within a short amount of time lowbies were running with twinked lowbies. This caused many issues and Turbine eventually implemented Korthos for all of the new players when it went F2P to make up for all the Twinking that had gone on.
That is why you start with the gear you do today. Players complained about the twinked characters and Turbine tried to balance it. That is also why the 4th and 7th level starting characters are equipped the way they are: to make them semi viable with a group of twinked 4th and 7th characters.
It makes sense to bind certain items for the balance issue. Twinking lowbies is an unfair advantage to single players with no friends for the foreseeable future.
If players can power level their friends or alternate accounts of their own toons, they will infinitely do so.
In NwN we had players that could shield a party through unbelievable hazards and gather to themselves accolytes with leeching qualities. As an assisting DM it was all I could do to restrain myself from intervening and banning the offenders that were spoiling the challenge, but I was overruled by the brass.
IMO the sense of boredom after being handed overpowered gear or levels breaks the game and results in huge numbers of players dropping membership.
U guys cant compare DDO with neverwinter, DDO have reeincarnate option which allow u to start from lvl 1 again with some extra bonus from ur previous lvl 20 class and ofc u will have all ur items/gold with u.
Ofc people who start playing the game will have less items/gold then a player who create a new character or reeincarnate, thats absolutly normal. That saying i dont rly understand why people whinne about balance in that state of the game.
I rly hate starting gear, u are what u are (noob at the begin) and will have to make quests/adventures to get stronger.
In neverwinter i dont think items wont make a big diference like in DDO coz in DDO its all about ur gear and character buid, in neverwinter i think will be more about fighting skills since is an action mmo (DDO was only like click the mouse and set ur gear to give more hit/dmg or have more defences).
I remember to play DDO with a tank role and all the abilities i had was intimidate, trip and disarm which i didnt actually use them much (beside intimidate ofc)
So for me, no starting gear and a big BOOOOO to those who complain about ballance low lvl's with a guy who have toons of gold/items in his main.
U guys cant compare DDO with neverwinter, DDO have reeincarnate option which allow u to start from lvl 1 again with some extra bonus from ur previous lvl 20 class and ofc u will have all ur items/gold with u.
The starting gear was a response to general twinking not Reincarnation which came much later. Anyone can twink, you do not need vast wealth, etc. When you have a character get to level 4 he will find something that would be able to be used by a level 1 that is much better than a level 1 could pull as loot from level appropriate quests.
BTA = Bind to account items simply keep powerful stuff off the auction house and get passed to other alts.
BTC = Bind to character items pretty much are a way to prevent both AH and twinking useage.
BON = Bind on equip allows for items to be traded/sold/given to an alt, but bind once you actually equip it.
All of these will come with their own drawbacks. Say you are grouped and the fighter could really use the BTA sword that you found, but you are thinking of someday making a fighter and thus could pass it down. There will be complaints if you keep it (the shard wars of DDO raids come to mind).
My opinion is it is your loot to do with what you will, however expect to see many threads complaining that class X kept Item A when it SHOULD have gone to Class Y.
That saying i dont rly understand why people whinne about balance in that state of the game.
Games are most fun and rewarding when the player's choices matter. For RPGs, where character stats play a large role in determining the results, having a significant imbalance means that player choices have little effect on the outcomes. Why bother trying to play well when you can get the same results while drunk, half asleep, and watching TV?
The starting gear was a response to general twinking not Reincarnation which came much later. Anyone can twink, you do not need vast wealth, etc. When you have a character get to level 4 he will find something that would be able to be used by a level 1 that is much better than a level 1 could pull as loot from level appropriate quests.
.
Thats easy, just make a lvl requirement to use according to the loot table per lvl, if a +2 is to overpower for a lvl 1-2-3-4 just make a +2 lvl 5 requirement, thats all up to the developers to balance.
All of these will come with their own drawbacks. Say you are grouped and the fighter could really use the BTA sword that you found, but you are thinking of someday making a fighter and thus could pass it down. There will be complaints if you keep it (the shard wars of DDO raids come to mind).
.
I call that ninja loot and if someone do that with me in party i will just block him and never make anything with him again, thats up to u to decide.
My point is, this is a completly diferent game from DDO, u dont see no one complaining at tweking overpower in games like WoW because the combat system is diferent.
@nekoatl: maybe in DDO u can win while sleeping/drunk/etc... because the game system is all about getting gear, build a good character and click click click (not for casters) and i bet in Neverwinter u wont win coz as far as i can see the game is more about fighting skills.
But i actually agree with u in one thing, since in DDO items makes a huge diference then yes starting gear is not that bad but it wotn make much diference in Neverwinter for sure
True, since Neverwinter appears to be more action and less RPG, the degree of accuracy in game balance required to keep the game fun should be reduced, but it won't be completely gone. It appears as though the to-hit mechanics will be re-imagined as damage modifiers, so in extreme cases you could (in theory) end up with really unbalanced situations where monsters hardly hurt you at all and one successful hit flattens them or the opposite scenario where you can skillfully land blows on them all day and just chip away tiny amounts of their hp when one lucky (or unavoidable) blow from a monster would kill you. These are extreme examples, and again, you're right that it's less likely to be a problem here, but my point is that even in Neverwinter, game balance can't be completely ignored.
One unique way to limit endless gear trading is to limit players to no more than 2 active toons.
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process.
I wouldn't like that. Best way is to make the game less dependent on gears and armor but more dependent on strategy and teamwork.
Using brains to solve puzzles which take time but make difficult parts easier. So we shouldn't need high quality armor unless we are skipping the puzzle.
I wouldn't like that. Best way is to make the game less dependent on gears and armor but more dependent on strategy and teamwork.
Using brains to solve puzzles which take time but make difficult parts easier. So we shouldn't need high quality armor unless we are skipping the puzzle.
I believe single player, despite the plans for a multiplayer game will still be the main customer for Neverwinter. Teamwork will not solve the issue of loopholes, cashflow and cheats that will plague the development team IMO. The beta teams will be asked to break whatever they can and we're counting on them to do so.
The race for better gear will be on. Binding gear to levels, IP addresses and class is the usual way to grapple with the issues. If skill improvements can compete with the need for an economic system, then there might be some wiggle room for what you want.
More than likely this issue has already been decided. We just need confirmation on the details.
One unique way to limit endless gear trading is to limit players to no more than 2 active toons.
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process.
IMO that is a bad idea (2 characters per acct) as it will harm longevity of the game. many people will play alts and alts are a way to keep the game going. As new classes and races are added, more alts will be created.
Originally Posted by kyllroy2
One unique way to limit endless gear trading is to limit players to no more than 2 active toons.
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process. IMO that is a bad idea (2 characters per acct) as it will harm longevity of the game. many people will play alts and alts are a way to keep the game going. As new classes and races are added, more alts will be created.
Its a horrible idea, but unless something is done to play "keepaway" with uber gear, its a possible solution.
I have seen single player, multi accounts circumbvent any possible fix in order to syphon gold and gear so, good luck holding back the dam....:rolleyes:
The only bound items there should be in a D&D game are the ones that are cursed. Or maybe some magical intelligent weapon that doesn't want any other owner.
I'm not a fan of all that bind on equip/pick up b.s. either. It's also weird for RP reasons.
Adventurer 1: "Oh look. I just found this +1 short sword on this skeleton. It feels really nice. Good balance."
Adventurer 2: "That is a nice looking sword. Here let me swing it around a bit."
Adventurer 1: "Yeah here you go.<tries to hand the short sword to his buddy>"
Adventurer 2: "You can let go of the sword now."
Adventurer 1: "Hmm. This is strange. I can't seem to hand you the sword. Let me check something. <places sword in his belt> Oddly enough I can put the sword in my belt but I just can't hand it to you."
Adventurer 2: "Look. If you don't want me to touch your new shiny sword all you had to do was say so."
Adventurer 1: "No really I don't mind if you try it out. Here see if you can pull it out of my belt."
Adventurer 2: "<tries to pull out the sword> I..can't...ergh..It's stuck. I can't pull it out. That is strange."
Adventurer 1: "See I told you."
Adventurer 2: "It's probably cursed. Now we have to go see the wizard and see if he can get the curse off of it. Then maybe you can sell it or something."
Adventurer 1: "That won't work. I can't sell it."
Adventurer 2: "What do you mean you can't sell it."
Adventurer 1: "I just read the inscription on the hilt here. It says 'bind on equip'."
Adventurer 2: "Oh <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>. It's another one of those swords. It seems like that's all any adventurer finds these days. Why if I could just get my hands on the enchanter that came up with that idea..."
I think high-quality items (like epic gear and stuff) could easily be magically soul-bound and not clash with role-playing.
Besides... like it or not, it's an MMORPG. It would be awesome if it followed tradition and realism everywhere, but before everything else it has to work as a game. Bound gear, for all the immersion-breaking factor they are, unfortunately are a necessity in almost all player driven economies. That's because there have to be "sinks" for most items in the game so as for the game world not to overflood with them. There have to be gold "sinks", ie NPC vendors selling necessary stuff, to keep gold from piling up in the world and causing inflation. Crafting acts as a "sink" for gathered materials. And binding rare items removes them from the market, because otherwise it will soon flood with 3 times as many epic swords and axes as there are players that can use them...
Things like that are not problems in single player games, but when you put in the factor of the persistant communities in MMOs, some such systems are necessary for the game to survive more than a few months before it becomes virtualy unplayable due to the server economy going nuts.
One unique way to limit endless gear trading is to limit players to no more than 2 active toons.
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process.
I think that this will only make the game less enjoyable... Even with 1 single character per player, the market will flood with used epic gear. The best gear are supposed to be hard to get, but by the time the first wave of people to reach gear tier x have moved to the next, all their used epic gear will be available for the second wave, and by the third and fourth wave the amount of epic gear of tier x in the market will be so high that ppl will just have to farm a tiny bit of gold and get what the first wave took hours and hours of monster hunting to find. That means that once a boss dropping say lv25 gear is introduced, it becomes obsolete in a couple months max... and that is without even counting excessive gear farming and alts...
Unfortuanately, it has to either be bound-on-equip valuable equipment or something more extreme (like increasing the stats of everything except the already dropped gears every few months to keep the gear-hunting on)
Im rly againts bind items in every MMO's, but before we have a serious discussion about this i think is VERY IMPORTANT to know first how items drop will work.
We dont have a clue what will be the propreties of the items, are they random props ??? there is a loot table for each aventures/quests ??? There will be named items ???
To be honest IMHO all the discussion about item bind is worthless if we dont have a decent information how loot will work.
But no you cant, while account bound items are transferable. There currently isn't the means available to transfer them. Mail wont work only a shared bank. And a shared bank is not something in game yet.
Comments
I should have clarified my statement about the self-grandizing. Wasn't pointed at any specific person here. More to the over all attitude that has been creeping in to the player base in the past few years. My apologies if anyone took it otherwise.
You touched on what many of us have been saying for several years, since EQ in my case. When running through a PnP campaign, unless it is a recurring villain, how many times do you get to beat an enemy & plunder his riches? As much as I was enthralled by EQ & many of it's progeny (OMG what do you mean WoW wasn't the first MMO? :eek:), there always was & always will be, unless we can all find a better solution, a grind aspect. If players only had to kill a Boss once, the Devs would have to pump out new content every week. There has to be a happy medium or better way.
Hopefully, the Foundry will mitigate this problem. Although, if a boss fight is fun, I like to repeat it just because it is fun. I don't need to be taunted by gear for that.
As for weapons in a D&D context, magic weapons for a L 1 character should be rare with a level 4 or 5 magic item (basing this on tabletop) being the absolute maximum one should realistically get as a L1 PC (l6 and up +2 or higher tier enchantments.) Whatever the maximum level (based on 60 levels for 20 tabletop so estimating 90 absolute if epic is ever used so it can be ported in) a character should start with a +1 when applicable in attack/defense and it should only go up or be available almost all of the time after fifteen levels. This is following the maximum enchantment of +6 per D&D 4E, but the ratio should be the same (tabletop base of 5:1 or online game of 15:1 based on six enhancement tiers from +1 to +6 but adjusted accordingly if the game goes higher enhancement which is definitely not recommended to stop power creep.)
When DDO first started if you were really lucky you could possibly pull a +1 weapon by the time you were level 2. IF you hit a rare in the Cartamon quests (level 2 quest) you had a very small chance of pulling an acid touched short sword (1 pt of acid per hit). It was the first glowing weapon you could possibly get. The game played just like D&D and was quite fun.
What happened is that as players leveled up and started doing higher level quests they were pulling flaming swords, etc. that were ML 4 or so. These weapons got passed down to twink the next character for that player. Within a short amount of time lowbies were running with twinked lowbies. This caused many issues and Turbine eventually implemented Korthos for all of the new players when it went F2P to make up for all the Twinking that had gone on.
That is why you start with the gear you do today. Players complained about the twinked characters and Turbine tried to balance it. That is also why the 4th and 7th level starting characters are equipped the way they are: to make them semi viable with a group of twinked 4th and 7th characters.
If players can power level their friends or alternate accounts of their own toons, they will infinitely do so.
In NwN we had players that could shield a party through unbelievable hazards and gather to themselves accolytes with leeching qualities. As an assisting DM it was all I could do to restrain myself from intervening and banning the offenders that were spoiling the challenge, but I was overruled by the brass.
IMO the sense of boredom after being handed overpowered gear or levels breaks the game and results in huge numbers of players dropping membership.
Ofc people who start playing the game will have less items/gold then a player who create a new character or reeincarnate, thats absolutly normal. That saying i dont rly understand why people whinne about balance in that state of the game.
I rly hate starting gear, u are what u are (noob at the begin) and will have to make quests/adventures to get stronger.
In neverwinter i dont think items wont make a big diference like in DDO coz in DDO its all about ur gear and character buid, in neverwinter i think will be more about fighting skills since is an action mmo (DDO was only like click the mouse and set ur gear to give more hit/dmg or have more defences).
I remember to play DDO with a tank role and all the abilities i had was intimidate, trip and disarm which i didnt actually use them much (beside intimidate ofc)
So for me, no starting gear and a big BOOOOO to those who complain about ballance low lvl's with a guy who have toons of gold/items in his main.
The starting gear was a response to general twinking not Reincarnation which came much later. Anyone can twink, you do not need vast wealth, etc. When you have a character get to level 4 he will find something that would be able to be used by a level 1 that is much better than a level 1 could pull as loot from level appropriate quests.
BTA = Bind to account items simply keep powerful stuff off the auction house and get passed to other alts.
BTC = Bind to character items pretty much are a way to prevent both AH and twinking useage.
BON = Bind on equip allows for items to be traded/sold/given to an alt, but bind once you actually equip it.
All of these will come with their own drawbacks. Say you are grouped and the fighter could really use the BTA sword that you found, but you are thinking of someday making a fighter and thus could pass it down. There will be complaints if you keep it (the shard wars of DDO raids come to mind).
My opinion is it is your loot to do with what you will, however expect to see many threads complaining that class X kept Item A when it SHOULD have gone to Class Y.
Games are most fun and rewarding when the player's choices matter. For RPGs, where character stats play a large role in determining the results, having a significant imbalance means that player choices have little effect on the outcomes. Why bother trying to play well when you can get the same results while drunk, half asleep, and watching TV?
Thats easy, just make a lvl requirement to use according to the loot table per lvl, if a +2 is to overpower for a lvl 1-2-3-4 just make a +2 lvl 5 requirement, thats all up to the developers to balance.
I call that ninja loot and if someone do that with me in party i will just block him and never make anything with him again, thats up to u to decide.
My point is, this is a completly diferent game from DDO, u dont see no one complaining at tweking overpower in games like WoW because the combat system is diferent.
@nekoatl: maybe in DDO u can win while sleeping/drunk/etc... because the game system is all about getting gear, build a good character and click click click (not for casters) and i bet in Neverwinter u wont win coz as far as i can see the game is more about fighting skills.
But i actually agree with u in one thing, since in DDO items makes a huge diference then yes starting gear is not that bad but it wotn make much diference in Neverwinter for sure
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process.
Only 2 active characters would kill me for I am an alt king, having to delete one class just so I could make another no thank u. :eek:
I wouldn't like that. Best way is to make the game less dependent on gears and armor but more dependent on strategy and teamwork.
Using brains to solve puzzles which take time but make difficult parts easier. So we shouldn't need high quality armor unless we are skipping the puzzle.
Using brains to solve puzzles which take time but make difficult parts easier. So we shouldn't need high quality armor unless we are skipping the puzzle.
I believe single player, despite the plans for a multiplayer game will still be the main customer for Neverwinter. Teamwork will not solve the issue of loopholes, cashflow and cheats that will plague the development team IMO. The beta teams will be asked to break whatever they can and we're counting on them to do so.
The race for better gear will be on. Binding gear to levels, IP addresses and class is the usual way to grapple with the issues. If skill improvements can compete with the need for an economic system, then there might be some wiggle room for what you want.
More than likely this issue has already been decided. We just need confirmation on the details.
IMO that is a bad idea (2 characters per acct) as it will harm longevity of the game. many people will play alts and alts are a way to keep the game going. As new classes and races are added, more alts will be created.
One unique way to limit endless gear trading is to limit players to no more than 2 active toons.
Also inventory limits, while annoying, server the same goal.
A high level requirement on Bags of Holding goes hand in hand with the process.
IMO that is a bad idea (2 characters per acct) as it will harm longevity of the game. many people will play alts and alts are a way to keep the game going. As new classes and races are added, more alts will be created.
Its a horrible idea, but unless something is done to play "keepaway" with uber gear, its a possible solution.
I have seen single player, multi accounts circumbvent any possible fix in order to syphon gold and gear so, good luck holding back the dam....:rolleyes:
I think high-quality items (like epic gear and stuff) could easily be magically soul-bound and not clash with role-playing.
Besides... like it or not, it's an MMORPG. It would be awesome if it followed tradition and realism everywhere, but before everything else it has to work as a game. Bound gear, for all the immersion-breaking factor they are, unfortunately are a necessity in almost all player driven economies. That's because there have to be "sinks" for most items in the game so as for the game world not to overflood with them. There have to be gold "sinks", ie NPC vendors selling necessary stuff, to keep gold from piling up in the world and causing inflation. Crafting acts as a "sink" for gathered materials. And binding rare items removes them from the market, because otherwise it will soon flood with 3 times as many epic swords and axes as there are players that can use them...
Things like that are not problems in single player games, but when you put in the factor of the persistant communities in MMOs, some such systems are necessary for the game to survive more than a few months before it becomes virtualy unplayable due to the server economy going nuts.
I think that this will only make the game less enjoyable... Even with 1 single character per player, the market will flood with used epic gear. The best gear are supposed to be hard to get, but by the time the first wave of people to reach gear tier x have moved to the next, all their used epic gear will be available for the second wave, and by the third and fourth wave the amount of epic gear of tier x in the market will be so high that ppl will just have to farm a tiny bit of gold and get what the first wave took hours and hours of monster hunting to find. That means that once a boss dropping say lv25 gear is introduced, it becomes obsolete in a couple months max... and that is without even counting excessive gear farming and alts...
Unfortuanately, it has to either be bound-on-equip valuable equipment or something more extreme (like increasing the stats of everything except the already dropped gears every few months to keep the gear-hunting on)
We dont have a clue what will be the propreties of the items, are they random props ??? there is a loot table for each aventures/quests ??? There will be named items ???
To be honest IMHO all the discussion about item bind is worthless if we dont have a decent information how loot will work.
But no you cant, while account bound items are transferable. There currently isn't the means available to transfer them. Mail wont work only a shared bank. And a shared bank is not something in game yet.