I forgot how mudflated live eq was

[Danth]

I haven't played Live in many years. I can't comment on it directly. I can say this: Most stat improvement is little more than an illusion. The stats that actually matter, such as kill rate, tank lifespan, and such things tend to stay the same. Hitting a 1000 hit point monster for 20 is effectively the same as hitting a 100000 hit point monster for 2000. You might feel stronger because you can go back and wreck obsolete content that used to be tough....but it's still no different than going back when you're level 60 and wrecking Black Burrow.

I don't know of any of the Everquest-style online games that have figured out how to control stat inflation. Players expect upgrades with expansions so it isn't an easy problem to solve. As I understand, the problem got so bad in Warcraft that Blizzard actually had to go in and lop off some zeros off everything. Whoever eventually figures out a good solution to the inflation issue might be seen as one of the genre's next big innovators.

Danth

[Swish]

Originally Posted by Danth [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I haven't played Live in many years. I can't comment on it directly. I can say this: Most stat improvement is little more than an illusion. The stats that actually matter, such as kill rate, tank lifespan, and such things tend to stay the same. Hitting a 1000 hit point monster for 20 is effectively the same as hitting a 100000 hit point monster for 2000. You might feel stronger because you can go back and wreck obsolete content that used to be tough....but it's still no different than going back when you're level 60 and wrecking Black Burrow.

I don't know of any of the Everquest-style online games that have figured out how to control stat inflation. Players expect upgrades with expansions so it isn't an easy problem to solve. As I understand, the problem got so bad in Warcraft that Blizzard actually had to go in and lop off some zeros off everything. Whoever eventually figures out a good solution to the inflation issue might be seen as one of the genre's next big innovators.

Danth

That's a good point, see Diablo 3 for new levels of ridiculous levels of generated numbers which mean nothing lol. Hitting a mob for 17 million when it has 450 million health etc.

[JurisDictum]

Originally Posted by Danth [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I haven't played Live in many years. I can't comment on it directly. I can say this: Most stat improvement is little more than an illusion. The stats that actually matter, such as kill rate, tank lifespan, and such things tend to stay the same. Hitting a 1000 hit point monster for 20 is effectively the same as hitting a 100000 hit point monster for 2000. You might feel stronger because you can go back and wreck obsolete content that used to be tough....but it's still no different than going back when you're level 60 and wrecking Black Burrow.

I don't know of any of the Everquest-style online games that have figured out how to control stat inflation. Players expect upgrades with expansions so it isn't an easy problem to solve. As I understand, the problem got so bad in Warcraft that Blizzard actually had to go in and lop off some zeros off everything. Whoever eventually figures out a good solution to the inflation issue might be seen as one of the genre's next big innovators.

Danth

As I'm sure we all know, EQ revamped a lot of zones that were becoming obsolete/dated in Velious -- like Fear, Chardok, and Droga. The problem is -- they never really wanted to put too much effort into revamping old content. It was a big deal when CT dropped the new Velious-grade items....fear mattered again. A lot of times they had a habit of introducing content that is interesting/useful, but not on par with current expansion. And it was a small minority of zones that were revamped or updated. This results in zone death and makes it difficult for new players to climb to the current content.

Now stat inflation may be an unsolvable problem. MMOs need new progression for expansions. But that doesn't mean that it ever should have gotten like it was when I tried to roll a war on live PoP. Lets just say -- I barely got 65 and quit when I realized I couldn't tank any good exp zones. They could have continued to scale the old content for newer players.

[jolanar]

All of the worst expansions in EQ are when they didn't raise the level cap (excluding Velious because the game was different back in Classic/Kunark and things like raid zones weren't even a thing yet.) I don't think that's a coincidence. Mudflation is inevitable.

[fadetree]

Originally Posted by Danth [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I haven't played Live in many years. I can't comment on it directly. I can say this: Most stat improvement is little more than an illusion. The stats that actually matter, such as kill rate, tank lifespan, and such things tend to stay the same. Hitting a 1000 hit point monster for 20 is effectively the same as hitting a 100000 hit point monster for 2000. You might feel stronger because you can go back and wreck obsolete content that used to be tough....but it's still no different than going back when you're level 60 and wrecking Black Burrow.

I don't know of any of the Everquest-style online games that have figured out how to control stat inflation. Players expect upgrades with expansions so it isn't an easy problem to solve. As I understand, the problem got so bad in Warcraft that Blizzard actually had to go in and lop off some zeros off everything. Whoever eventually figures out a good solution to the inflation issue might be seen as one of the genre's next big innovators.

Danth

Implement player aging. Your character starts at a fit 20 years old, and then ages according to a mix of factors, including level, time played, and actual real world time since creation. The amount of time you've got played and the level you are at control the aging rate, and to a lesser extent the real world age does as well. Once you get to 60 years or so, your abilities start to decline. When you hit 100 you can't do jack except whittle and make fun of youngsters.

OR

lose the whole idea of levels. Nobody keeps getting more HP every level. Implement tons of skill based progressions, but they are capped. Expansions are really just expansions of the playable world, and don't have anything to do with 'hardness' of content. Implement weapon and armor breakage. Make death REALLY hurt, as in you lose some character attributes or skill levels if you die too much in too short a time. If you die every now and then, plus arrange for the highest possible level res, then you won't take much damage. But if you die over and over you'll quickly have a worthless character. Of course, no one would play except nutjobs who like their games to be tough, but...we're there already [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[rayeatts]

Originally Posted by fadetree [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Implement player aging. Your character starts at a fit 20 years old, and then ages according to a mix of factors, including level, time played, and actual real world time since creation. The amount of time you've got played and the level you are at control the aging rate, and to a lesser extent the real world age does as well. Once you get to 60 years or so, your abilities start to decline. When you hit 100 you can't do jack except whittle and make fun of youngsters.

OR

lose the whole idea of levels. Nobody keeps getting more HP every level. Implement tons of skill based progressions, but they are capped. Expansions are really just expansions of the playable world, and don't have anything to do with 'hardness' of content. Implement weapon and armor breakage. Make death REALLY hurt, as in you lose some character attributes or skill levels if you die too much in too short a time. If you die every now and then, plus arrange for the highest possible level res, then you won't take much damage. But if you die over and over you'll quickly have a worthless character. Of course, no one would play except nutjobs who like their games to be tough, but...we're there already [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Yes! Death should have big ramifications, but not so big that it pushes frustrated players out of the game. Weapons and armor should have a durability stat on them that simulates how much they've been used.

Once a piece of armor has been used by multiple characters, bought and sold numerous times, it's durability stat should be lower like for example 32 out of 100. At a rating like that it should have a % chance of totally breaking, even during combat, causing you to die.

Then players would value armor that was very durable and pay more for it. Then it would give people more opportunities to keep acquiring new armors which people would probably enjoy.