XP, Loot, and Death Systems

[cyberjesterb]

I have a few ideas regarding the current systems in place and how they might better fit what I have perceived as the overall intent of the server as a whole. That being slow progress with a focus on developing your characters not just in strength, but as people. As well as fostering real risk when one throws their character into the fray. I may well be off-base with any or all of these. But these ideas have been in my head for awhile and it doesn't hurt to make the suggestions at least.

Regarding XP I do still and have always been in favor of the current time based cap system. However I feel like it would benefit from an addition to this so that the gain can be spread out over time more evenly. My numbers could almost certainly use adjustment, but my initial thought it something like a weekly cap of 1000 experience. This would not step on the toes of the current monthly cap raise. But would prevent the mentality of needing to rush to grab that 3000 ASAP. It would also prevent people such as myself with returning characters from having a nearly limitless cap. I think having it be over a weekly period of time would allow for those with a more limiting schedule to still make use of their 1000 cap spread out over their playtime at any point in that week without feeling too rushed.

Regarding loot I feel like the overall wealth gain atm isn't too far off the mark most of the time for risk involved. However I do have some issue with the number of powerful magic items being discovered in less risky content in the current system. It seems to be a numbers game more than a risk/reward game where this is involved. With those doing the greatest volume of content having a better chance of getting very nice rare items rather than those doing the most dangerous content. I would really prefer to see what can drop at low level or less risky areas be limited to non-magical or at least less impacting forms of magic only. For example light effects or skill bonus items. These are still fun effects but leave the real game changers out there to be a driving factor to push yourself.

Regarding death I have always liked the systems in place currently and felt they were fair. But it does seem like stat loss is becoming less of a meaningful deterrent to throwing oneself into danger without treating it with proper gravity when risking your life. I do not propose that any of the current systems be changed at this time. But once again I feel they would benefit from an addition. I'm leaning toward either a hard cap or a timed cap for number of deaths that can be reversed using raise dead before a character is permanently gone. What this number should be I am not entirely sure of. But for the sake of starting discussion I would say less than 10 as a hard cap. Or less than 4 per month as a PCs spirit and body must recover. I know death of a character isn't fun in the moment. But it IS powerful and should mean something more than a one gold setback on the eventual path to that Greater Restoration.

I am aware that these are likely to be controversial ideas. Perhaps they are not in fact in the best interest of the server or the intent of the staff and desire of the playerbase. But these are my feelings about how things could be made better and I've been wanting to share them for awhile. I know I grouped several big change suggestions all in one thread here. That is because I feel all of these systems are connected to one another. I look forward to seeing what people think of it all.

[Kerstman]

All interesting suggestions, Cyber. I think it's good to not shy away from controversy since all suggestions are good ones and anything should be discussable. For now I have little to add about the monthly/weekly XP cap and the magical items, but I am interested in seeing what other points of view can be provided by other players.

About death. I am personally in favour of death having heavy consequences and serious impacts. My preference is to have a soft-permadeath system like we have now. If a stat drops below 3 your char is out. I'd argue it may be interesting to up this limit to something like 5 instead, since going to 3 is miles away for any character that has been IG thus far. The suggestion for a 10th death to be the final one is interesting too, but I am not in favour of a hard permadeath cap. It should be resettable by some means. Whether that is a greater restoration or something else does not really matter to me. As long as it is costly, rare and having a big impact just the same.

Something else that I would not mind seeing is temporary stat decrease after so many raises/respawns. A formula could be as follows
- Temporary stat loss duration = (Raise amounts-2)*24 RL hours (negatives not possible)
- Temporary stat loss amount for all 6 stats = (Raise amounts-2) where again negatives are not possible

This would mean that a char can be raised/respawn twice without losing something temporarily. However, if it keeps dying and dying it shall suffer more intensely and longer after each raise/respawn. These could be stat points that are not possible to heal unless a greater restoration is provided, which resets the whole count. These could be added next to any other system, they could replace what is being used now or they could be integrated in what we now have. It could for instance be made so that when a char drops below a specific ability point, even while it is temporary, the character is permanently dead.

An example for clarification. Johnny the commoner has the following stats : 12/12/14/14/10/12
He dies twice and these stats are not yet affected
He dies a third time and for 24 hours they are 11/11/13/13/9/11
A fourth time would make it 10/10/12/12/8/10 for 48 hours
Now, wisdom is Johnny his weakest stat. Which means if he would die for the 10th time without this procedure being reset he is perma dead, since it would drop his WIS to 2 for 8 RL days

I shall follow Cyber with saying that my numbers could probably also do with some improvement, but here's a thought. Keep on sharing.

[OldBear]

Not crazy about the idea of if you go below 5 points in a stat you are perma dead. It takes an incredibly long time for raise a plat coin to cure the stat losses Ornak was never high in the charisma area and has taken I think 2 loss in char. That would put him very close to being in real trouble. He has had enough issues from an rp sense with his low charisma. For instance being driven out of his home in Sarshel and now living in a shack.

[Silver Snow]

Agreed, good points overall.
On XP, that's not a bad suggestion but it is I think trying to address an edge case and thus skewing the whole system to do it. It would mean that players can now get 4k XP a month instead of 3k, which would mean that within 2 months a player can be 5 and halfway to 6. Of course, numbers can be adjusted, but it's an added bit of complexity. To address why I believe it to be an edge case, the limitless xp cap after absence applies only to myself as well as cyberjesterand perhaps two other players. People will always take breaks, some smaller and some longer, and perhaps the only real concern is with the longer ones. The biggest cap on progress will usually not be the cap so much as a player's availability to do dungeons. If anything, I'd not terribly mind seeing a two week cooldown on dungeons rather than a one-week one, as more dungeons are being added and it'd maybe give incentive to search out new ones. Though the more people you add that have done some places and people that have not, the harder it will be to plan productive dungeon events with a longer cooldown, just a thought. I feel that as it stands now, however, dungeons done at regular intervals are not looked on too favorably which a longer cooldown may address as well.

On loot, I'm with you. I'd rather magic items specifically be rewarded for higher level groups at harder places so that they feel like reward rather than chance. Having messed with loot tables before, that's tough to do and customize without having dungeons that -specifically- are known for dropping magic items. Some random chance is always going to be involved but I agree that some items found recently were a bit too lucky.

In regards to death, I have grown to accept it as it is, now that I have characters at the levels they are. At low levels that amount and the penalty seems rather bleak, but competent reasonably careful play and mid levels makes it attainable (still personally prefer INT not to be included, but that's been discussed to death). I don't think we need it to be more scary because that sword of Damocles isn't going to make players regard it any more seriously than they do now..and in fact, longer-playing players just have more chance to perma-die. If it's 10 or so raises between greater restores instead, then I think that is a rather useless thing to add. Any character with 10 actual raises (and thus like 7 or more stat point losses the way I've seen those rolls go) is going to be so utterly crippled that player attitude or not, they will be forced to respect it. The further someone gets down in that, the more likely they are to die anyway. Impending permadeath in my opinion will add nothing that drastic stat damage doesn't already, and we have that permadeath already at 3-level stats. Maybe that -should- be at 5, admittedly, as I cannot imagine anyone having an actual character and RP'ing a stat at 4..you're either crippled, bedridden, dumb as a rock, limbless, or a literal troglodyte.

[Feronius]

Regarding XP, if I understood your suggestion correctly you mean for the XP cap to reset weekly or every ten days, also no longer allowing for the cap to stack and build up while you are not actively playing a character?
I like the suggestion either way. This would still discourage powerleveling just as much as the current system, it is essentially the same amount of XP per month, but because the cap is spread out more and resets more frequently it should be far less discouraging for players who happened to hit the cap very early that month or whose playtimes are irregular.

If you did not mean to suggest for the cap to no longer stack, then I would like to suggest it anyhow. Or to at least limit the amount of XP you can build up to a certain amount, to prevent players from rolling alts with no intention of playing them for the coming months just to let the XP cap stack up.


Regarding loot, as I do not have a character above level 4, I have yet to see the full picture and can't really comment.
I do agree that certain dungeons should never have any chance of dropping magical items beyond a certain value/ level.


Regarding death, I believe the current death system is fairly harsh for a death system as it is.
If anything, the way that stat loss is applied should be looked at/ fixed first. Suffering stat loss comes with mechanical consequences that can be needlessly punishing on the player (not to the character/ roleplay) as they often inhibit your progress or mess with your build. It can cause someone to lack the requirements for a feat (on this server you often do not have a second chance to pick up specific feats) or to permanently miss out on valueable skill points. There are also other, no doubt unintended, side effects that are significantly harder to explain, such as the loss of language slots.
This can make it come across as a strong discouragement for the player instead of a consequence that their character faces. Especially for new players or new characters something like this can be extremely off-putting, as there is no way that they will be able to afford the costs of a Greater Restoration anytime soon.

If the stat loss could somehow be applied to the character in the form of a debuff (that lasts throughout resets, obviously) instead of altering the base stats of a character, it would eliminate these needlessly punishing side effects.
It would still be a harsh penalty. Affecting saves, rolls, carrying capacity, skill levels, spell slots and a bunch of other things. But it just prevents the player-side frustrations of messing up the plans for your character's build, missing language slots or stalling to click the level up button for completely out of character reasons. I personally feel like making a fun, yet viable character build is enough of a headache as it is, but maybe that is just me being a bit of a D&D noob in some regards.

I admit that Kerstman's idea of making stat losses more temporary, but with bigger or overall stat penalties, is also very interesting.

[cyberjesterb]

About XP

On XP, that's not a bad suggestion but it is I think trying to address an edge case and thus skewing the whole system to do it. It would mean that players can now get 4k XP a month instead of 3k, which would mean that within 2 months a player can be 5 and halfway to 6.

No, I'm suggesting it be added to the current system. This would mean that character progress is slowed by two caps: the existing overall cap, and the new weekly cap I am proposing. So for example let's say it's a brand new character with a 3000 XP cap. In order to reach their overall cap, must gain the XP over several weeks rather than rush to it in one go. If this new character caps out each week for 3 weeks they will be able to reach the overall cap, which will prevent further progression regardless of the weekly cap. What this will also limit is the unimpeded growth of a character that has simply existed in the server vault for a very long time even when not being active.

If anything, I'd not terribly mind seeing a two week cooldown on dungeons rather than a one-week one, as more dungeons are being added and it'd maybe give incentive to search out new ones. Though the more people you add that have done some places and people that have not, the harder it will be to plan productive dungeon events with a longer cooldown, just a thought. I feel that as it stands now, however, dungeons done at regular intervals are not looked on too favorably which a longer cooldown may address as well.

While I'm not necessarily against a longer cooldown on individual dungeons to help inspire people to explore more. I don't think it solves the issue I'm trying to address with my proposed XP system addition. There are simply too many dungeons on the server at this point for this to nudge people into slowing down a bit.


About Death

I don't think we need it to be more scary because that sword of Damocles isn't going to make players regard it any more seriously than they do now..and in fact, longer-playing players just have more chance to perma-die.

I don't see it as a problem if characters that have been around longer have more chances to permadie.

If it's 10 or so raises between greater restores instead, then I think that is a rather useless thing to add.

I'm not really in support of Greater Restore resetting my proposed death cap. Greater Restore is already a much sought after goal for restoring the statistics of a character and does not need any more added benefits. I'm not against there being some method (Preferably not automated through an NPC.) of restoring some number of one's alotted deaths if a hard cap is implemented.

Any character with 10 actual raises (and thus like 7 or more stat point losses the way I've seen those rolls go) is going to be so utterly crippled that player attitude or not, they will be forced to respect it. The further someone gets down in that, the more likely they are to die anyway. Impending permadeath in my opinion will add nothing that drastic stat damage doesn't already, and we have that permadeath already at 3-level stats. Maybe that -should- be at 5, admittedly, as I cannot imagine anyone having an actual character and RP'ing a stat at 4..you're either crippled, bedridden, dumb as a rock, limbless, or a literal troglodyte.

I personally feel like the current system for permadeath is in fact far too forgiving. The number of deaths/respawns a character would need to accrue in order to take an ability stat below 3 or even 5 seems like an incredible sum. Given the random chance nature of if a stat will be lost at all and if so, which stat it will then be. Therefore I respectfully disagree that an overall number of deaths (With or without a time limit.) allowed before perma would be less effective than the current system at making it a serious matter.

Right now, from what I have witnessed, Raises seem to be little more than a speed bump on the road to one's next Greater Restore. It seems highly unlikely that anyone would ever achieve permadeath except of their own choosing in our current system.

[Silver Snow]

I think my major point is that mechanically implemented permadeath as a whole is one enormous gaffe on an rp server. As it stands now, by the time someone gets close they're unplayable anyway so there's no reason to change it. This is, again, an rp server where characters have stories and the players design them and are helped along by DMs and other players. It should be a player's choice to permakill an older character and no other reason, period. Even when other players or DMs are involved this is a matter that should involve consent and not the result of clunky nwn mechanics. Younger characters already get hit with it by dying early and without knowing anyone that can raise them.

In regards to XP, apologies for misunderstanding. Now that I do, I think the system adds even less as even short breaks are punished under this. I understand and agree that if a character isn't played for 3+ months they should get their cap stalled, but it should be in the case of a lengthy absence. A month with no XP gain isn't significantly lengthy. I'm certain that the only people this would benefit are those that don't like seeing others level at rates faster than they themselves did. There are many important aspects to character development that someone rushing without the paced rp to support the progress will lose out on. There are checks well in place for this, and not everything requires a dry and mechanical intervention.

[Vogelens]

Ultimately, the real question that should be asked: "What does it add for RP?"

The answer, to me, seems to be "Very little." It is overcomplicating things, and making it mechanically harsher and mechanically more hardcore, without influencing RP at all, really.

I feel especially the death system would be more punishing, especially to new players, than it would gain much benefit from RP. I still see death RPed out, and something dangerous. People do fear it ICly (And oocly due to the harshness of it), and effects are roleplayed out. Subtly in some cases, but they are there. If it is made even mechanically harsher, on an RP server, then it might only serve to draw less new people in, and make less new people stay.

There is no need to try and reinvent the wheel, and overcomplicate mechanics, when the complication/harshness of mechanics have been a debate on forums already, I feel. In a game like nwn, or most online games, there are many unavoidable deaths, also in part due to OOC reasons. Lag, the extrmely wonky combat mechanics the game has, etc. Accidental deaths, or simply RNG not working in your favcour. Losing a stat and a ton of money is bad enough due to those reasons, but in my opinion, losing a character through permadeath is not something that really belongs in NwN of this age, especially not an RP server. An RP server should be about the RP, the stories of the characters. Not harsher and stricter mechanics. It would hurt the game as it stands more than it would help.

[Poisonous]

I've come to love and appreciate the vision of the server, which is why I've come to my below opinions--that vision doesn't happen on it's own, but rather takes community effort to enact.

Regarding...

XP
Agreed. Currently it's too easy to rush through early levels, and to rush through later levels if your overall cap is high enough. Our system shouldn't favor older players who never played, it should slow progress down generally. I like Cyber's suggestion for fixing this.

The solution (or perhaps any alternatives that might be proposed) would encourage players to slow down, as well as make progression more realistic because it's not happening so fast. Progression on this server was, as I understand it, always meant to be more slow-paced. I like that about this server, but as it stands the current mechanics are no longer sufficient to maintain a slow leveling pace.

Loot
The current system strongly favors the decision to grind easy content over the decision to tackle challenging content. This is backwards of how it should be. I think that magic/special items need to be moved out of easy content and into hard content. Much of difficult content on the server has disappointingly low rewards.

To get personal for a moment, I'm deeply disappointed and frustrated--yes, jealous--by the fact that despite playing the oldest character on the server, who is perhaps most capable of defeating the hardest content on the server, and who has tackled and defeated hard content...my character falls behind on magic item accumulation. My character has accomplished a great deal, but has seen far less magic/special items than characters who are a few months old.

Frankly, it gouges my motivation.

It's not about "I want more magic items", it's "there's too many magic items dropping, and they're dropping into the wrong hands". I realize that can be taken as mean, and I hope it is not taken personally, but I think we can all agree that grinding easy content should be less rewarding than tackling more dangerous content.

Imagine a level 8 character. Do you imagine him having earned these skills and gear fighting the same easy dungeons over and over, or do you imagine him earning it from bravely trying new and uncertain challenges?

As with the XP, I think the current mechanics are no longer sufficient to maintain a slow and mild accumulation of magic items.

Death
I agree that it's ending up as more of a speedbump. It bothers me less than the loot and XP, however, and I could take it or leave it.

I'll respond to some things other players have said:

Ultimately, the real question that should be asked: "What does it add for RP?"

Well, the ideas don't make a lot of sense framed that way, sure. These suggestions don't necessarily add to RP. They do address problems that harm the server's RP culture.

Does rewarding grinding too much add to RP? No.
Does rewarding grinding too much detract from RP? Yes, absolutely.

It is overcomplicating things, and making it mechanically harsher and mechanically more hardcore, without influencing RP at all, really.

I don't feel that the proposed changes are overcomplicated, and I feel their benefits far outweigh any additional complications. Does it make things a bit more hardcore? Yes, but in a way that is good for the server. It influences RP by helping address issues which detract from the RP.

I feel especially the death system would be more punishing, especially to new players, than it would gain much benefit from RP. I still see death RPed out, and something dangerous. People do fear it ICly (And oocly due to the harshness of it), and effects are roleplayed out. Subtly in some cases, but they are there. If it is made even mechanically harsher, on an RP server, then it might only serve to draw less new people in, and make less new people stay.

I'm going to have to strongly disagree here. I have personally felt like death is still not being treated with enough weight or consequence. I feel it tends to be more common for weakness to not be displayed, for characters to go back to business as usual the next day, etc.

An RP server should be about the RP, the stories of the characters. Not harsher and stricter mechanics. It would hurt the game as it stands more than it would help.

I agree that an RP server should prioritize RP, which is why I strongly favor Cyberjester's proposed changes (or potentially alternatives to dealing with the problems).

Mechanics which favor grinding over tenacious heroes facing risky dangers--this is not helpful to the server's RP. It fails to reflect what should be the RP.

It should be a player's choice to permakill an older character and no other reason, period. Even when other players or DMs are involved this is a matter that should involve consent and not the result of clunky nwn mechanics. Younger characters already get hit with it by dying early and without knowing anyone that can raise them.

I don't agree that it should be 100% a player's choice whether they are permakilled. I feel that this idea is entirely contrary to the idea of a roleplaying server. If a character, say, made the choice to storm the king's castle waving their sword around, would we say that they should not be permakilled as a result?

Consequences enhance RP. RP becomes more shallow and meaningless if there are never any consequences. In fact, this is a rule of good storytelling.

Now that I do, I think the system adds even less as even short breaks are punished under this.

I don't see the problem with this, personally. Perhaps it can be adjusted to two weeks or something, but characters shouldn't earn progression if they're not being played at all.

I'm certain that the only people this would benefit are those that don't like seeing others level at rates faster than they themselves did.

I don't think that was called for.

There are many important aspects to character development that someone rushing without the paced rp to support the progress will lose out on. There are checks well in place for this, and not everything requires a dry and mechanical intervention.

Yes, but:

1. That doesn't prevent it from happening anyway.
2. If there is an alternative to prevent too much grinding or racing through levels, I'm personally open to it.

[Toros]

I think my major point is that mechanically implemented permadeath as a whole is one enormous gaffe on an rp server. As it stands now, by the time someone gets close they're unplayable anyway so there's no reason to change it. This is, again, an rp server where characters have stories and the players design them and are helped along by DMs and other players. It should be a player's choice to permakill an older character and no other reason, period. Even when other players or DMs are involved this is a matter that should involve consent and not the result of clunky nwn mechanics. Younger characters already get hit with it by dying early and without knowing anyone that can raise them.

In regards to XP, apologies for misunderstanding. Now that I do, I think the system adds even less as even short breaks are punished under this. I understand and agree that if a character isn't played for 3+ months they should get their cap stalled, but it should be in the case of a lengthy absence. A month with no XP gain isn't significantly lengthy. I'm certain that the only people this would benefit are those that don't like seeing others level at rates faster than they themselves did. There are many important aspects to character development that someone rushing without the paced rp to support the progress will lose out on. There are checks well in place for this, and not everything requires a dry and mechanical intervention.

I think the intention for this would be that xp wouldn't be necessary, simply logging in. In my opinion a month without logging in is pretty significant and stalling xp cap makes sense considering that RP and xp would both be on hold.

The current system gives enormous advantage to players who were simply here longer. I have maybe half a dozen level 1 characters I've never played who have caps that would be equivalent to levels 6-8. If Jerek were to die for some reason or I would decide to play them, a new player would be left in the dust.

When I was playing nightly I would hit my xp cap in about two weeks, probably doing 3-4 dungeons a week. I could either have capped off 2 characters with no loss in progression or theoretically cap off 4 if I just ran dungeons.

I'm not sure that's a perfect solution, and I'd guess that most older players already have multiple characters that are functionally uncapped as far as xp is concerned.


As far as death and storytelling goes, I see the advantage of both strategies. Dying off in a dramatic fashion has a number of advantages, and being able to usually tell your character's story to the end can be immensely satisfying.

On the other hand, a character I knew well and loved playing died against his will, beheaded on a ship after being framed for a grisly cult ritual by other players. It wasn't how I intended him to die, but it made the shock of his death very real and natural for other characters.

Kind of like game of thrones vs other fantasy literature. Both have merits.


As far as TER is concerned I take death very seriously and Jerek is extremely death-adverse as a day to day thing. As a result he has had one death and maybe 2 respawns, and only taken one point of stat damage (int, damn it!) since December 2014. It does seem to be rather easy to not permadie as long as someone makes at least one mid-level friend on TER, but I suppose that is to be expected as the server develops and there are more and more wealthy and high-level characters. Inflation is inevitable without gold sinks, and if the cost of healing stays static... well you get the rest.

Loot I definitely feel seems to peak at mid level dungeons, tapering off both at the easiest dungeons and some of the most difficult ones, though that could simply be because the highest level dungeons haven't been updated in a while. I think that acquiring magic items is always going to be a numbers game, and Jerek in particular benefits from having some magic items that I believe are no longer on the loot tables. There also seemed to be a period where many dungeons were overgenerous both with money and with magic items, and I heard of a number of sets of standard or better full plate appearing in dungeons that weren't particularly tough.

I personally would prefer if the best magic items were only available by doing the hardest dungeons the server has to offer, and that may be the case currently, but it's not easy to run those regularly enough to get a good sample size. I like planning more difficult and dangerous trips which have the best and rarest rewards, as the combat is exciting and the prospect of treasure that can not be found anywhere else makes me salivate.

I also believe that it's good to monitor and discuss these things from time to time, especially since I am far removed from the new player experience.