"Exploits, Nerfs, Banning and Overequipping" by Gaute Godager

[_______________Bjond]

Here's a tiny thought: if there were no bugs, there could be no exploits and no exploiters. Another great quote: "fix the problem, not the blame."

[____________Theumage]

IMHO NanoTechs will become useless if FC reduces the effect that a nano program has if the buff wears off. I like the idea of just not being able to cast when the skills aren't met.
I'm a lvl 30 NT and i struggle to take on mobs that are equal level... I use all the implants and buffs that I can get myself.
That means by highest implant I can use is ~35 and same with my nano programs. This is totally due to lack of IP, if I had more IP I could go higher.

I think that if you remove the IP cheats that is the first step.
After make the buffs last ~20% longer
AND (most won't like) make the weapons users unable to use their weapon if the buff runs out, just like if they run out of ammo (nano for others).

That way if they can ligitimaly use the weapon then GREAT, but if they uber-twink themselfves to get a ql200 assault rifle equipped then its not possible. That way in groups its totally possible to use a weapon ~15-20 levels higher, same with pets and nanos. But ONLY for the Duration of the Buffs!

Theumage

[________Dumbasbricks]

Flame, Whine, Grunt, Complain, Cry, Shout... This comment is strictly only for "Over Equiping"

Do what you feel is necessary after reading this post. I wouldn't care anyway. But ask yourselves the following questions:

1.) Game Design. Why create buff program lines and implants if you didn't have overequipting in mind? If that was the case how can a legit game design be called an exploit? I refuse to think that with as much content there is in the game to blatantly overequipt that your game designers failed to see the end result of this and it was not an intended feature.

Implants with abilities and skills buffs.
Nano programs with abilities and skills buffs.
Nano programs (self) with abilities and skills buffs.
Weapon/Armor Equipment with abilities modifiers.
Tools with abilities modifiers.

That seems to be an awful lot of game content geared towards overequipting for it not to be an intended feature? So which is it? Gamers cry exploit so you will also? Gamers who dont' spend time looking into what they can do to improve their characters in game. The ones who beg for credits. The ones who cry why somebody else has a better toy. The ones who refuse to actually learn about the game and their profession. The same ones who cry nerf when their support class can't take on an enforcer one on one.

Do what you must. The many aspects of the game are broken. To fix another portion based on facts obtain from a broken part is just digging yourself into a deeper ditch. I commend you all in your hardwork. But it's not the quantity of hours you invest slaving behind that monitor screen that matters. It's the end product you produce and it's quality and value to the customer. Good Luck... listen to those little voices in your head and Nerf away. In the end when the dust settles and clears. You'll have a long list of Fixes/Patches and a "0" customer account database.

~ If it's not broken... by all means break it and see change take shape ~

[Paffy]

Then comes Mikebond who has a first good idea for ages for this problem. Good job Mikebond.

I support the suggestion that you cant buff people that are grey to you.

This will severely limit the buffs you can give to others and is a great way to get things in check.

Please consider this as option without limiting the overequipping in other ways.

Zarch and bunch of other chars.

PS. Grey people should be allowed to buff anyone higher than them though so only make the change otherway around.

[___________Nocturnal]

Overequipping:

The sulution to this is plain and simple.

Just make it harder to equip more ncu's and ncu platforms.

With no ncu, no power buffs, no overequipping.


((P.s. Make it harder, not impossible. It's part of the game and i like it.))

[___________BonzaiBob]

Well, I really don't believe that ""mild"" overequipping is a problem. In fact I believe its an important part of the game. I do however think that overequipping in the extreme is a huge problem.

Since the game is basically set up to allow over equipping it would be a drastic and most likely catastrophic thing to eliminate all together. Make overequipping to a resonable level 'safe' and good practice but to the extreme/borderline exploitation level something most people would like to avoid.

I think it would be best to place a limit on how much overequipping can be done without penalty. Say 10 levels before character level 100 and 25 levels post character level 100??
So basically if you can buff yourself into your equipment -or- get a buff from someone of SIMILAR level to your own to equip an item, you won't incur any penalty. It's important to take into account the "of similar level to your own" statement which will protect the feeling of comunity and the rewards of working together. I don't have the time to go check out all classes nano's to see just how much you can be buffed at various levels but I think the +10 and +25 rule would be about right in most cases. Funcom could review buffing at various levels a lot faster than I could anyway and adjust the rule as needed for various levels.

Now that we have a basic rule planned out we need to discuss penalties for equipping to far ahead of your level. We know we can't make a blanket penalty because each class will be affected differently by it. So lets break it down.
If we penalize each category of equipment seperately we can safely achieve the needed effect without worry of gimping one class more than another.For example, weapons would affect those that rely on them for damage, nerfing armor would affect everyone to some extent but mainly those without roots, nerfing implants would most likely affect nano casters.

So lets say your level 50 and thus affected by the "equip +10 under character level 100 rule" and you put on a QL 68 weapon by getting a buff from someone more than 10 levels above you. You will incur an accuracy penalty of -30%, causing you to automatically miss 1/3 of all shots fired with that weapon. This penalty should scale with the amount of level difference. So if you equip something of even higher QL, say a QL 90 weapon at character level 50, then you will suffer a -60% accuracy penalty and possibly cause mild injury to yourself while using the weapon. If you can manage to slip into something 'God-like' then your penalty will be -75% accuracy, automatic injury on every shot wether its a hit or miss and a random increase in ammo useage as well as reload time. This change will affect PvP as well as PvM so as not to encourage anyone to overequip just for PvP matches.

For armor overequipping another type of penalty must be used.
I suggest using an initiative penalty since it makes sense that armor beyond your skill would impede your movements. This should not be quite as harsh as the weapons penalty however, since armor is something that saves lives rather than takes it. Overequipping armor is only trying to preserve you own life afterall .
So breaking the +10 before lv 100 would incur a mild -100 to all initiatives. Going to the next scaleable level and equipping excessively beyond your level (like +40) would gain you a -500 to all initiatives as well as your run speed!! OUCH! And finally the 'God-like' level which would win you a -1000 to all initiatives, run speed, and place all of your evade skills at 0. So equiping 'God-like' armor would be anything but 'God-like' especially with 0 evades.

Now, implants pose a peculiar problem. If you cause them to not have the effects they are being equipped for then you have a cascading "avalanche" of possibly crippling results. Since people often stair step their implants to obtain excessive skill levels. By stairstepping I mean you equip a +10 implant so that you can then equip 5 other implants that bring your skills up enough that you can finally start switching out the early implants one by one for maximum skill gain. In the end you end up with a body full of implants you technically can't even wear! If we imposed a penalty on the skills the implants raised then you could cause other implants to gain penalties as well and so on down the chain until you finally incur penalties on implants you can normally wear!!
So to solve the problem is actually quite difficult. How do you discourage overequipping here without "nerfing?"
Well, you do it the same way we did before. Have the game check the QL's of your implants versus your characters level. Don't bother doing hundreds and hundreds of skill checks to see if you can currently equip it, that would just be a nightmare!! By only checking implant QL's you avoid a lot of possible bugs which could be potentially nasty.
As for the penalty, if the QL of ANY implant in the body excedes the character level by 10-25 as per our rule then start places penalties on the character. The penalty should increase for each additional implant so that the more implants you have in you that you shouldn't, the more your going to gimp yourself.
Again, a penalty that makes sense in a role playing fashion is to cause the "Body" skills to drop. Since the implant is fighting with your body for dominance.
For a single implant that excedes your ability to control it(level +10-25) you will recieve a -15 to all "Body" skills. Those being strength, stamina, agility, sense, psychin, intelligence, body development, and nano pool.
For 2 implants -30 to all Body skills.
For 3 implants -50 to all Body skills and an incurable damage over time that removes all natural regenration.
For 4 implants -60 to all Body skills, incurable Dot for 4 damage every 6 seconds.
For 5 implants -75 skills, Dot for 10 damage/6 seconds.
For more than 5 -150 skills, Dot for 50 damage/6 seconds, and nano casting skills locked. You would be in to much physical pain to concentrate on casting anything, so no casting until the implants are removed!!
This is particularly harsh for a good reason, it will help prevent people from getting double penalties from overequipping both implants in addition to using the skills gained from the implants to overequip weapons/armor. You can still use implants to overequip the other categories but you are much less likely to leave them in since these penalties on top of the ones for the other categories would cripple you.

It is important to NOT use skill checking for implants because many classes do not have a need to up the treatment skill which is needed to equip these. It is often needed to have a treatment skill buff to equip implants of a QL = to your character's level so doing skill checks would be a mistake. Not to mention the cascading affect mentioned earlier.

Doing things this way would allow mild enough penalties for the slight over equipper so that its tolerable enogh to leave their items equipped until they can "grow into them."

[___________BonzaiBob]

As far as banning people for obvious exploitation, provided you have proof. I have always found the 3 strikes and your out rule works well.

1st offense = official warning
2nd offense = temporary suspension
3rd offense = Banned for life

Severity level DOES matter. If a character is found obviously exploiting something that gives them an advantage PvP or PvM and any claim of ignorance can be easily discounted by common sense then its an offense. If they are doing something they claim is unintentional or claim ignorance and it isn't something that common sense can discount as being true then just ask them to stop without an offense being recorded. However make a note on the account of that the character was warned against such actions and if it occurs again they will have no excuses.

Things like the run speed debuff bug actually increasing your run speed falls under the common sense clause. Since you normally wouldn't want to debuff yourself you can't claim you didn't know. However if a mob you were fighting cast it on you, its not your fault so its up to the ARK to decide what the situation is. If your a class that can't cast a run speed debuff then I would safely ignore it, etc...

If a character is doing something that isn't intended but doesn't have an impact on how the game is played, just ask them to stop. When I say how the game is played I mean something that affects earning experience/money/items. An example would be the levitation bug in Everquest, where it used to be possible to reach places that weren't intended to have players walking on by repeatedly casting levitate to gain altitude. It was just something "fun" for the players to do and for the most part didn't affect how the game was played. However, using the same bug you could get to places where mobs couldn't hit you back, therefore it would be something that affects how the game is played and if the player was caught using it in that manner he would be punished according to his record. If the player was just "playing" and exploring the possibilities of the game then they should be politely asked to stop as it is not intended for the game to function in that manner.

[___________Nocturnal]

Originally posted by Tedric


That would be fine if this was a short, one-off game, but it's not. Board-game analogies, while fun, are not that helpful.

As Gaute said in his article, they change the game in order to make the max. number of poeple happy. Currently, some people are happy with the current equipping rules (usually the ones with twinked equipment), and some people are not. I think that the second group is the larger one, but I don't know for sure.

What is known is that the current game ruleset forces everyone to play the "let's twink our characters and forget about game design intentions" game in order to survive. I hate that, and see this whole game spiraling into a situation where only the twinks can survive "normal" monsters, while players who try to follow the spirit of the rules (instead of the loopholes) find 50% missions more and more difficult (and impossible, at some point).

At some point, the non-twinks are going to leave because of this. The $100 question for Funcom is, of course, which group is bigger. Because no matter what happens, some group of players is going to be disgusted with it. Funcom needs to decide what they want the future of the game to be, and act accordingly - and realize that they will get flak, either way. The current system is a design flaw... but some people don't want Funcom to correct this one, because it would degrade their twinked/exploited/whatever characters.

Ideally we could set up two servers, like you said, and have one server continue with the current ruleset and have the other be the "nerf" server for those of us who prefer balance to powerlevels. Unfortunalty, I don't think Funcom has the resources for something like this.

Agents can NOT use pets....

And i don't think its terrebly unbalanced that agents have trader buffs. Everyone can get them, just have to get them from a trader (or an agent). So that can not be considered unfair. The only thing that could be unfair with the whole fp system, is the self only buffs. Other than that its not unfair at all.

[_____________psych54]

I hate to say this but people love exploits. Like in real life there are certain things that make life easier. If u dont include them in the game people wont think its realistic. Ok, i must admit that certain things just are unfair but others aren't. For instance, if u buy something which costs a lot of money, i think u should be able to get certain exploits with it. If u spend up to 10,000,000 cred for a vehicle i think u should get certain benefits from it. Over-equipping is also very important. It gives the player the feeling that there is an easy way to become stronger. This is NOT bad. People need to be able to advance pretty fast. For certain breeds and professions it's almost necessary to over-equip to get further in the game. I am an nanomage nanotechnician, one of the harder prof in the game and i must say that without over-equipping i would change my profession in a flash. We nanotechs have a pretty hard time lvl'ing, well harder than the rest, and we need to have certain exploits in order to keep the game interesting. If we didn't have certain possibilities to lvl faster, the game wouldn't be fun at all and i would probably stop playing it. It's fun to find a certain bug in the game that makes it easier (without it making it too easy). Also i think it's cruell what u are doing to certain people. Like with the range thing i think u should think about the harm u cause. A lot of people boost certain skills for a reason. To see that reason being taken away is just harsh. In certain cases people would never have boosted a certain skill if they had know u would just make sure that they dont benefit from it and that is NOT cool.

[_____________Malicea]

Agent have pet the MP pets
Else i wanna say something, there is a good way too see who is over over equipping you will see them still with fight stuff on when they go dance in baboons or go to a wedding
That s all but RP
else look at some classe like caster et MA they can t overequip
by Exemple MP must have full NCU buffed by himself for be avaible to fight correctly else they are more that **** but other class who overequip weapon bah they are always rdy for fight they can fight without any buff

Malicea

[_______________Ormus]

Well,

I guess I didn't read your article very well at first Gaude and didn't see all the implications.

Exploiters need to go.
Do you do enough about them? NO.
Rubi-Ka is almost an exploiter's paradise...
So instead of saying yes, yes we gonna take care of the problem, apply the solutions.
You kept the same stance from day one but little has changed on that particular point...

Now what is over-equipping?
You seem now to consider it might be a mild form of exploiting...
Well I'm sorry, but I have played my engi since day 1. I was playing an engi in beta.
I'm now lvl 77 and using a 106 pet with the help of a team mate who's an MP. What's wrong with that? Wasn't it in the game design from the beginning?
When I started this chat, I could see how fast ppl around me could lvl or do missions while I couldn't even do an AVG mission with my sissy pet. 1 green was a big danger, 2 greens was death on spot.
So, very early in the game I had to find ways to use a higher bot than me. Have I been exploiting? Sorry but my answer will be a big no, no! I just used the tools that were available around me to achieve that. And it did require some form of thinking and planning which gave interest to an otherwise routine of hacking and slashing around...
Don't take that away from the game. That's why some professions find some use also, and can make money as well.

And here is the difference between exploiting mindlessly and playing cleverly.

I'd say ppl complaining about over-equipping and saying they don't do it, just do not want to bother with all the investment in time and money that it represents (i do not dare to use the word lazy here...)

Now take every other profession and I'm sure they met the same needs as i did as an engineer. That's why most chars are buffed up their nose.

So leave us alone with the way we play the game, fix the bugs, the economy and get rid of exploiters.
Then we'll start to have a decent world to live in that might be able to autoregulate itself.

Now if you really feel ther's a bit of exageration in over-equipping, why don't you just make it impossible for 2 chars say with a difference of 15-20 lvls to buff each other?

That might meet some of your worries while letting us play this game the way we've always known it abd the way we might like it...

Ormus

[__________Spacegipsy]

Originally posted by MrGumby
I am extremely sad and annoyed that all the whining of players who don't want to spend their time 'overequipping' and begging/paying for high level buffs, seems to have moved Funcom to introduce even more nerfs. In my opinion, overequipping (as opposed to exploiting) is a necessary part of building up a strong character, wether for PvP or PvM playing styles. Let me illustrate by this example:

My main char is a lvl 54 Fixer. I am currently having big trouble in PvM agains yellow/orange mobs and I will simply not enter any Arena of PvP, as this would mean certain death. This situation cannot be remedied substantially as my equipment is many times better than it 'should' be (ql 78 armor, full set of ql 70-90 implants, ql 87 Mausser). I have spent AGES doing missions for cash to pay for all this, and additional days of begging/buying buffs from high level players to let me equip it.

Based on this, can anybody PLEASE give me one good reason why Funcom should nerf items that have been equipped using buffs? I think not.
Should Funcom go ahead with the suggested nerfs, I know my character will suck to bad he will have to be deleted in favour of an NT reroll. Many others will certainly feel that way too.

In my opinion, it is simply unacceptable to change the game mechanics in such a drastic was, long after official release. Making comp.lit. buffs self-only for Traders has already removed the opportunity for players to have crazy amounts of NCU for high lvl buffs, thereby drastically reducing the overequipping issue. As for the old players, who do have 'uber' ncu belts, this will not be a problem once their characters catch up in level to their equipment. Leave things as they are for now, perhaps with some minor adjustments, but nerfing buff-equipped weapons/armor/implants is NOT the right way.

I couldn't agree more with every single word you say.
My Lvl 79 Agent (using a self-over-equipped rifle) can't solo an *even* (=50%) Mission.... go figure.....
If *anything* whatsoever is done about over-equipping - a whole lot of balancing in PvM will have to be done. I don't know about PvP (haven't really done it so far), but stricter regulations in there all you want, but leave PvM (and over-equipping) *as is*.

My 5 cts.

[__________Spacegipsy]

Originally posted by Carrah


Obviously you haven't played your agent lately. Even with 40% damage cap, a soldier can burst/fling/full auto you to death in about 4 seconds. Hmm, I'm getting killed in pvp. Let me make list of classes that killed me, so I can complain...

Indeed, indeed... we did a friendly arena-fight the other day.
My Lvl 79 Opifex-Agent (with a > QL 100 Stigma) against a Lvl 79 Solitus-Soldier who was - mind you - under-equipped - because, his skill is *above* the requirements for his pistols.
Within extremely short time (and I had even gotten my AS off), he had taken me down to below 1/3 health whereas I hadn't even scratched him down to half.
So tell me more about *owning* agents.... - this is a story of the past - in PvP and more so in PvM.
Why do I still play my Agent? Because I like it.. I like the versatility, the changing into different profs (even at great disadvantage), to help people out with buffs, when the *real* profs aren't around.
But nerf agents anymore and you might as well scratch the class.
And *NO* I'm not asking for soldiers to be nerfed now.. it's ok, I can't solo against a soldier, that's fine, I'm not supposed to - being an agent - I can still be of great help in team-plays or sniping unexpecting victims (hehe, just kidding here, would be nice if really possible).. as an agent I'm not supposed to be able to *stand my man* in a one-on-one against a soldier.

Nuff said.. just please keep that ole nerf-bat away...

[goen3o]

I was playing with one of my character.. and I bought one robe. then went on a mission.. then when I looked again i had 2 robe's. one on and another i my inv in a backpack.. i don't know how it happened.. what shall I do so Funcom don't blaime me for exploiting the game. Shall I delete it or shall i keep it??

[_________Sir Budhard]

I agree on point 1 and 2, but don't nerf over-equiping. One of the joys of this game is planning, buffing and upgrading your character. Just make sure everyone has the same posibilities and it won't anger players...

[Solo]

DISCLAIMER !
I did not read ALL the posts, so something may have been already said.
DISCLAIMER !
As I have already said, agreeing with the most of the posts I read, I don't overequipp weapons couse since I am a soldier I need to be able to switch weapons during a fight. I self buff into a lvl 123 gun and I am aways able to use it during fights  I do overequipp armor to some extent, I am lvl 74 and using lvl 69 (yes ) to lvl 95 armor. I feel that this is necessary to be able to play the game at higher level and I enjoy it the way it is as it is always a new challenge, so I don’t ask for the game to be easier. I heard from other people who have higher chars then mine that at even higher level the game becomes may be even too much hard, dunno yet by myself.

As far as I know the exploits (treatment bug, double implants, implants that went in wrong slots ....) and the most unbalancing mechanics (the comp lit buff that allowed a lvl 1 char to have 100 NCUs and be buffed to the roof) that allowed a VERY unbalancing overequipping are gone.
Actually a lvl 20 agent (sorry if I use agents as an example eheh) cannot equipp a lvl 120 gun any more. The only way to overequipp at the moment are a good implant planning, self buffs, other prof buffs and traders wranglers that I would like to keep distincted from others prof buffs, since they last a few minutes and cant be used during a fight. Their only purpose is to buff to use a higher ql item and they seem to be the only real problem here, since the most of posts that are against overequipping are against overequipping WEAPONS.

So there is a new idea, why not making the wrangler using a HUGE amount of NCUs, increasing as the ql of the wrangler increases, so that you can be buffed only with a wrangler appropriate to your level ? This will solve the problem of the low levels twinkies that seem to scare so much some of you, and at the same time save the purpose of an entire line of buffs, save Traders from another big nerf (no I don’t play a trader …), and save us SOME FUN.

Because something that you have to understand is that this game is great because it let you build up your guy as you want more then any other game, and that’s because I defend the overequiping issue so much. Overequipping and in general building up your guy using the game mechanics, is a reward for some effort you put in it and it is something that keeps this game interesting. I am sorry to say this and I know it may seem a bit rude, but if you want a game where you don’t have to thing about how to develop your guy, where everybody at your level have exactly the same equipment as you, where you can just get online and play half an hour using the equipment you get from loot or quests, well, then go play DaoC. It’s a nice game, very stable, bug free, I played it for a week and got bored to death, but it maybe be the right game for you. You say you want the game to be played as it was designed, well I say WE PLAY THE GAME THE WAY IT WAS DESIGNED. This game is deeper and more complicated to play then others, if you don’t like it or don’t want to learn how to play it sorry, but this not the game for you !!!

Another compliant that may have some sense is the NT one about the fact that a debuffed NT cant use their max ql nanoformulas, this may be addressed without nerfing all of other prof can’t it ? I may be wrong but nanos damage don’t count the opponent AC don’t it ? This already balances a bit … also a buff for int and psy could be put in game so they may use higher ql armor, even since the lack of it may be because they are not supposed to be toe to toe fighters … dunno any ideas are good here.

Solo

[Deskclerk]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Gummizluv
[B]I would like to had that I have yet to understand what over-equiping is.

I am a 55 Atrox Enforcer using a Q106 Hammer.

Self buffed (2HB implants - General expertises - Headcracker - Challenger) I could equip Q85 or so. With the help of a good Wrangler I was able to get above Q100.

Finding this Wrangler costed me a lot of time and some money. It also required that I had enough NCU to stack the buffs.


This is exactly the problem of over equiping. If you can keep them buffs up then you should beable to use that weapon, however when the buffs wear off so SHOULD the ability to use that weapon.

This is not a new idea, NT's, Doc's, and MP's face this issue every day if we want to use programs that we have to be buffed for: we have to keep the buffer around, we have to also give up the valuable NCU space to keep using the program. While we are using the program we have to have the ncu which means, that is one more hp or ac program that can not be running, but we get to use the higher level program its a trade off, where as with a weapon you trade nothing to use the weapon, u get the buff in the city, equip you weapon, end the program and head off to fight.

You should be able to buff into weapons, however when the buff wears off so does the weapon it no longer works end story.

Now if you use one set of implants to get on NCU and get to where that 120 wrangle gets your weapon equiped, then u head to the surgey clinic take out them implants and put back in your fighting implants, as soon as you switch implants and leave the shop, the game checks your reqs at the door you no longer meet the reqs: your weapon dont work end of story

Why is it this is the way it is for "mage types" but it is ok for weapon users to power up equip a weapon and leave it on?

Forget the only loose percentage of the weapons ability if you do not meet the req's, because it would be a nightmare to program and would be another disadvantage for the casters. We can not use a program for a percentage of what it is. (they already have this with stuff like lesser, weak, greater superior etc......) we use lesser programs the way you should use lesser guns, or i could just twink a char buy the highest weapon i can and never buy another weapon again for as long as i can. what good is that? part of this game is getting equipment it is a big part of this game wheater you buy and sell or run missions getting equipment is the most important aspect of the game in my eyes.


Take off all the equipmet ONCE. put it in the bank.

Now as far as dual weild pillows go........ HEY I NEVER TOOK MINE OFF so i still have em, are you now saying i am an exploiter ???????? and why are your examples alway directed towrds mage types??????

I know you have a HATE for the mage types there is no OTHER WAY to explain our treatment and no answer from you on our numerous bugs, fixes and nerfs. When in fact i belive the mage types are the closest to how the game was originaly concieved in playability and rules and what not.

The idea of pillows in the first place just proves it WHY WOULD YOU MAKE US LOOK STUPIND WITH PILLOWs unless you hated us?

Any way enuff about mages read our boards,but what i have said about the weapons is probaly the easiest most acurate way to return to the games origanal intent and after that is implenmented GET RID of dammage cap. a level 150 nt should be able to kill a level 75 in one or 2 shots.

besheba lvl 125 nt (rk1)

[_______FrankieMaster]

i worked hard to earn my tokens, dont even think about taking them back.

first fix the bugs, then annoy further your player base.

i dont care about de-equipping my items (go ahead if you find any), but my tokens are different. i had to kill zillion monsters (it was pretty boring i have to add, but i sacrificed that time to gain something when i go out hunting)... got 65 and now i'm level 17.
i never used termiante (check your logs - if there is any) - instead i let monsters killing me to loose the exp. this all comes back to that stupid idea of loosing exp. you should not have done that.

Since i paid for the service, dont try to put it like i'm doing something wrong... i LOST that exp to GAIN tokens.

Sincerely,
Frankie

[Holinor]

Overequipping is normally a social interaction.. I do not mind that.. I like helping total strangers lower than me to get an edge for a short while.. It is one of the few social happenings we have so... Let it be, really... New people learn fast from the friendly old people

But the exploiters and cheaters.. I would say you are way too lenient. They do not play to have fun and join in the game, they play like a Quaker, or a cheating Counter-Striker.. to show off how kewl they are that can cheat. The game and the community means nothing to them.. and normally they are abusive as well, if someone tries to takl to them about it. No.. I think most of us that has played online games before knows the behaviour of the constant cheaters and I think no one will feel it is unjust to just blow them out of here. It will only make this game better and raise the atmosphere if you do not have cheaters around that have to brag and show off how they can beat the system.

Like this:

What do they add to the game? What good do they do..?

What do they destroy in the game..? How much bad can they do..?

Will new players, and longterm players want the cheaters there all the time, especially if it turns into war and a lot of PvP, or would they leave because they are constantly killed by a multitude of cheaters, like in Counter-Sjtrike?

Easy.. Most leave. You do not have Punkbuster, only yourself. You have to be the ones busting the punks. So.. Do it fast before they have spread their bad seeds to others, instea of letting them spread what they know to ten others, then kicked, ten others spread it to a hundred.. they get kicked, the hundred spread it to... Kick the one in the beginning instead.

[______________Tedric]

To clarify my position on the "overequip" issue:

I have nothing against people using equipment that is over their level. That's part of the game, and it takes work and creativity to boost your stats above your normal maximums.

What I don't like is the fact that the game engine only checks the requirements at equip-time for some items (weapons, armor, etc). This leads to people whining for a one-off boost to their stats so they can equip some stuff - after which they can forget about it. Zero skill, thought, or anything else required. Just a temporary buff that does not have to be repeated.

It's a whole different ballgame when you have to boost your skills permanently. That takes planning, hard work, and credits.