So the biggest problem with over-equipping occurs in PvP, and only twinked and over-equipped do PvP because everyone else just gets killed repeatedly.
So make over equipping illegal in PvP, simple.
That way you wouldn't have to rebalance PvM and players wouldn't be nerfed they only would be on a lvl playing field in 25% zone.
It did seem like you tried to make a PvP change but it affected human mobs? Maybe you could link it to the gas instead of the type of character
Over equiping is what makes this game fun FUNCOM! If i can get all the buffs the ncu and evrything i need to equip my new kicka.. gun without exploiting then so be it. Punish the exploiters not the honest gamer! If you nerf over equiping you will lose more than half your player base i gurantee. And with all the new online games outhere, you wont get them back! Over-equiping is hard time consuming work and if a player has the will to be better than evryone else then so be it!
That is waht role-playing is all about. There are weak panzys and powerfull people in the world the choice of what the gamer wants to be is his!It just takes dedication people to be a bada..And if i get punished for being a dedicated gamer that likes to be the best char i can be then this game sucks and the desigers are stupid for always trying to balace the game.
Roleplaying? What a crock FUNCOM. In the real world there is no balance and their shouldnt be in the gameworld either!
And listen up game director! I want a game constitution! Yea you heard me. Our forefathers did it for america, so i know you Finish boys can do it to! I'm sick and tired of rule changes dang it! Lay down a good set of rules and stick to em! Thnx for your time
I always thought it would be fun to give nano casting characters a staff or rod in their hands when running a program; this staff/rod would represent the different nano programs.
Just like a gun, this staff/rod would be in your hands and would change based on which nano program you choose to run. Just like a gun, no matter what debuff happens to you, as long as you continue to have the staff/rod in your hand equiped you can continue to run the last nano program you were able to "equip" before getting debuffed. And just like a gun, when you switch out staff/rod in favor of another nano program, your skills are checked to see if you can equip the new program.
As a soldier, I can continue to use whatever gun I have in my hands when I get debuffed. My only penalty is that I can't swap out guns. So I like the idea of giving the nano casters a "gun" in their hands(the staff or rod) so that they can continue to fight with whatever nano program is "equiped" even when debuffed.
Or don't even have a visual staff/rod in the game, make it all behind the scenes so only the code sees something in the hands.... I don't care.. I'm just tossing ideas around.
if banning over equiping ever happens i really hope they fix the weapons ,like the damn pistols with dual ql63 atlas dominators "+5 pistol augmentation on each" and ql50-60 implants for akimbo and pistol i can barely take out a yellow MOB, if i had to use a ql53 pistol with my adventurer i couldnt run a 50% mission and would have a hard time runing a 40% mission, even with a fair amount of over equiping im severely gimped its rediculous especially for PvP i have no chance even now
"The answer to all the over-equipping issues is pretty easy actually. Cause everyone to lose ALL of their items on death and have to recover them at the reclaim terminal. "
I think this is a reasonable suggestion.
Exploiters? Aggressively ban them. Ban them early and ban them often.
Over-equipping is a problem, but also a symptom of other problems as well, I think. I believe it is quite tedious to over-equip. We have to ask different people to buff our abilities, and we have to buy armours, weapons, implants and clusters many levels above us, which are expensive. But still, many people like to push their limit to over-equip. Why? I don't pvp myself, so I won't talk about pvp.
I believe one of the reason people like to over-equip is that they can fight the mobs better in solo missions. I think the mobs are not designed quite well right now. People have to over-equip such that they can manage 50% missions. I believe by fixing the mobs may helps the situation right now. If the mobs are designed nicely, people won't need to take so much troubles to over-equip. It also helps the non-combat professions to do solo missions. And it helps to promote varieties in developing characters. For an example, a lot of enforcers are using hammers or support beams as their weapons. If you pick other weapons which are not as good, you have to re-roll. Right now, we have to play our character "correctly" in order to survive. Designing the mobs better also helps in the current situation of pistol. Yes, quite a few pistols are useless. But actually, some pistols are ok choice as a weapon. They are ok if the mobs are not like what we are having now.
So, what I want to say is that in addition to fixing the over-equipping problem, it is also important to fix some related problems as well.
Exploits and overequip suggestions
Ok, I think everyone's in agreement that exploiters need to be hit hard, so I'm not going to comment much on that, OTHER then to suggest you first WARN them they are exploiting. There's been a couple things I've done that I wasnt sure if it was an exploit, have actually petitioned to ask, and have gotten NO answer back whatsoever.
As to overequiping, I do think this comes down to one particular problem...lack of class focus. If God ever gave me complete control over what would change (And yeah, I know this isnt EVER going to happen), here is what my ideal list would entail.
1: Go through each character class, and give it a single main focus. For example, a Nanotech's would be nukes, a soldier would be ranged combat, doctors are healing, and engineers construction of most hardware. These should be placed somewhere where everyone can see so there is NO confusion about what that classes reason for existance is. If you CANT find a reason for that classes existance, get rid of it.
2: Build missions AROUND these main foci. Not everyone is a combat class, and yet this is about all the missions concentrate on. Get in, kill everything in your way, get out. Engineers should be focused on creating items, and yet the XP and monetary gains they actually get for doing this is rediculously low. A non-combat class character SHOULD be getting his heiney kicked against an equal level opponent (whether player or mob), but GIVE HIM AN ALTERNATIVE! Increased XP/Money for making items! XP for healing critically injured players! You should be able to get the idea.
3: Aside from the main focus, give each character class the choice of several 'lesser focuses'. These should ALSO be clearly labeled, but unlike the main focus of each character, should be able to overlap a bit. We have a bit of that now, but it's a bit TO generic. Tighten this up some. A lesser focus can duplicate a main focus of another class, but that main focus should ALWAYS be better and more efficient at the same levels. An important step here, IMO, is that all characters should have at least one lesser focus they can concentrate on that involves noncombat means of gaining XP that are actually worthwhile.
4: Each character will have a max cap on how high a stat can be buffed. Rather then set a hard number, make this a percentage such as 10%. For example, if you had a Comp Lit of 200, you could raise this to 220, but if you had a pistol skill of 50, you could only raise it to 55. This way you can overequip some, and rewards in some way those who choose to concentrate on certain abilities.
5: This has been mentioned before, but I like this. When the buff you used to overequip an item runs down, rather then remove the item or just decrease its efficiency, INCREASE the chance of problems. Higher percentage of fumbles, failures, and the like.
6: Change buffs to STILL be effective. As a suggestion, VASTLY increase the amount of time they remain active so, for example, that level 100 buff Mr. Trader cast on you lasts for days. This way you have a LOT more time to worry about getting rebuffed so it doesnt happen right in the middle of a critical mission area. If needed for play balance, tweak casting time, NCU cost, and nano cost.
7: Equalise mobs! With the change in mission structure, make it so a yellow mob has a 25% chance of beating a COMBAT class (on average) and go from there. Non combat classes WILL have a harder time of this, but should ALSO likely be considered a couple levels lower so would be gaining a higher level of XP if they manage to kill it. (They should be gaining most of their XP through other means, but reward them if they meet the challenge)
8: Allow the POSSIBILITY of IP change AND Character change, but make a penalty for doing so. I'd suggest loose 5 levels worth of IP right there. This way the option to redistribute IP (And even change your entire class if you wanted!) is there but it's not something to be undertaken to lightly.
9: THOROUGHLY test the changes before implementing the patch. It would require a LONG test period so if you can, you might want to think of making a 2nd test server so the original one can be used for less drastic testing of smaller, temp fixes. WARN people way ahead of time that LARGE amounts of changes are coming, give some indication of what you think is going to be changed, so people can plan the future of their characters with it in mind.
I dont really think any of these suggestions would be implement, unfortunately, due to the length of time it would take to test and severe code changes, but I'm sure bits and pieces can be used. Anyways, comments?
A few points I feel worth mentioning;
What is over-equipping? There is obviously some confusion over this judging by many posts. Funcom should probably elaborate a little so we are all clear on what they mean by it. My take is that it's simply having items equipped/fully functional when you do not currently meet the skill requirements. So you can buff into things, but once those buffs wear off there probably should be some penalty applied.
Now equipping items above your level is not the issue, it's actually a good idea to do it, and fully intended. However, it makes no sense to have skill restrictions on items and then basically ignore them after an item is equipped. The skill check should be made on use of the item, not equipping it. How Funcom could miss this is beyond me, and why now leave it so late to address? This is something that Verant often do, and not something I would recommend Funcom repeat. When you see a problem ACT, don't put it off hoping that it will sort itself out as it rarely does.
A few mentioned DAoC earlier. One of the better features of that game is it's built in check - item wear. This makes it much easier to remove/nerf things since unless something is really out of whack you can just leave existing items in place as they will eventually leave the game due to wear. Something most future MMOG's should seriously consider... plus it's great for the economy.
Actually, getting realistic on the token issue, I think a really good balance would be to change the token boards. Make a 750 board, and have ALL 1k token board users degraded to that board. Give the 1k board MORE incentive to get, and make the 750 board a better balance between the 400 and 1k board. As it is now, you have to get 600 extra tokens for bonuses that won't really mean squat when you really need them.Originally posted by MiKEBoND
Bear in mind that the tokens were a big maybe after 4 years to get 1000 Canidy
But. I do believe 1000 boards should have a titlelevel 6 requirement, and 400's for title 5, and downwards.
But also, dont allow buffing of greys!
Also throwing some map nav bonus on a 1k instead of comp lit might make more sense for higher level people.
It shouldnt take 4 yrs to get a 1k board, it should just take so many RL hours. Those who play like mad get them, those who don't, suffer. And it should be like the 400 board goes on at lvl 100, 750 board at lvl 150, 1k board at lvl 190, and make that 1k board geared for a lvl 190 character.
I also think if the lower board gave skill bonuses like +50 something or another, there would be incentive to get them, as it is now, tokens are a pain in the butt.
Funcom how about that group token system? At least in groups I might have a chance of reaching that 400 board in a year!
I support truwind out of principle, not because she is in my guild. I got to laugh at your stupidity. Buying tokens was not an exploit was it? Not anymore than everyone using that treatment machine. IMO there a heck of a lot more QL200 implant ppl out there unbalancing the game then there are 1k token board users.Originally posted by CaptFallout
@ CaptFallout: leave out personal accusations for which you have no proof - or do ya?
I have proof, and I'm sure many of the other leaders have seen Truwind brag about only earning 50 of his 1000 tokens.
Canidy... your support wouldn't have to be because you are in Tru's guild... would it?
1000 token cheats are the worst of em.
If funcom just banned everyone with 1000 tokens (1 month ago) we'd be rid of most of the most extreme cheaters.
But nooooo... funcom is too lazy to do anyhting like that!
Also what is the difference of the guy/gal who bought some tokens, or ran them cause it didnt matter if u killed anything, you just got a token. I have heard of many ppl who have done that.
Read my suggestion on tokens, I honestly think the whole system is flawed and that should be revamped as well.
IMO dupers are the worst cheaters. All those credits on ebay, people with 500mil in their accounts, it is sad when a crappy QL100 hanshi coat goes for over 5mil - they aren't that hard to get, kind of like tank armor used to be, and tank at most sold for 500k - see how time and duping makes the prices go skyhigh huh.
Fallout you should think more and contribute something to this discussion rather than pointing the finger. I haven't mentioned names, just general problems in my posts.
Verant is well known for how the deal with exploiters. While some people would say they're too harsh, exploits are unheard of in EverQuest. In Anarchy Online, exploiters really don't have a lot to lose if they're caught. They lose their account. Big deal. They can just as easily get a new one on the same credit card and use those same exploits they did before to get a new character up to a good level with some sweet ill-gotten equipment. Exploits serve to ruin the game for everyone. It no longer becomes a contest of who's the better player, or whose character has gained more levels legitimatly, but it's a contest of who knows and who has taken advantage of the most exploits. And this sort of thing gets old REALLY fast
How exploiters are treated DOES need to be discussed, but not in terms of how they are treated, but in terms of what constitutes an exploit.
If, while on a mission, a character discovers a mob that is 'stuck' how should a character react? Should the character do everything they can to try to get the mob 'unstuck' despite the fact that that almost certainly give that mob a tactical advantage?
Should they avoid the mob, and thus jeapordize the mission?
Should they scrub the mission?
Keep in mind the palyer did not deliberately arrange the mob's condition...
I have my answer, and the rest of you have yours, but what is the 'official' answer?
What level of 'taking advantage' consititutes an exploit, for purposes of this discussion?
As for 'over-equipping,' I am in favour of reduced effectiveness for weapons based on current skill. I like this option because it makes debuffs usefull without rendering them too powerful.
It should be noted, though, that QL does not in any way relate to character level. After all, two SMG's of the same QL, but different makes are generally not equally effective. Even more so is the difference between, say an assault rifle and a pistol of the same QL.
As for nano's, and 'fairness' for those that rely on them, it seems (based on many posts) that NT's are one of the top three classes right now. If nano's as they currently exist could not stand up in PvM against the effectiveness of 'conventional weapons' that would not be the case.
Kim
Stop punishing tacticians
The first two questions are a great deal different from the third... reason being, true exploiters are a minority in the game (hopefully?). The third question affects nearly every player; the honest one as well as the dishonest ones.
1.) Tough call, but I'd say just don't bother. What they did was wrong, but a large number of players will always feel compelled to try & keep up with their peers. Some people would've never started exploiting, duping, or whatever they did, if they hadn't been horribly outperformed in-game by their exploit-abusing comrades. As far as I know, most of the major loopholes are pretty much behind us, at present. Plus, it's too long after-the-fact. Going forward, let any new exploiters feel the wrath.
2.) Present system seems good enough. If you feel you must change it, then whatever you do, DON'T change it ever again.
3.) Don't change a thing. Over-equipping is a 'problem' only for people who don't understand the intricacies of the game, or people who are too lazy to bother. Strong character building is one of the game's most enjoyable aspects. You've already dealt a blow to the game mechanics tacticians, when the Trader comp lit buffs were changed to self-only (no comp lit buffs means heavy-duty NCU gear won't be equippable in the early game... therefore, new characters will be limited in their attempts to stack buffs for over-equipping purposes).
If you want an intelligent game that caters to tacticians (plus the majority of current players), then leave the system as is. If you want to cater to the wishes of 'casual players' (people who don't want to spend a great deal of time at this... but also, a number of newer players, & maybe some of the younger people), then go ahead & change the rules. In fact, change the name of the game as well. Because it wouldn't be AO anymore.
But first, ask yourselves:
What types of players are going to stick with a game longer? Do tacticians stick with a complex game longer than a casual gamer sticks with a simple game, or vice versa?
This is a game-style preferrence issue; nothing more. Many of us have pounded away mission after mission, just to afford that highest-possible-ql gear to equip. This increases our characters' potential, & expands upon our character-building options. This is not exploiting, nor is it unfair, because it can be done by any & every player.
-Templar Red
my opinion about over-equipping is that their shouldn't b any penalty for it.
on my first character, i was totally lost bassically, a nano-mage soldier, from lvls 8-30 i proly used the same freedom arms lvl 4 and 8... eentually at around lvl 35 i started to really learn the game, and learn what i was doing. i discovered implants, major buffs and what weapons i should b useing, eventually, although reluctantly i decided to make a new character, an atrox soldier... since i had the help of the assets from my first soldier, i could upgrade faster, and with the guns i should use. when i started playing again a week ago, i got to lvl 25, from 19 in about a day, i also at lvl 25, with the help of many imps, and buffs, i equipped a lvl 53 novaflow, and i also had lvl 36-40 armors. i went to pvp because i felt confident in my uberness... as soon as i got their, a lvl 20 trader asked if i wanted to deul... i said sure, not thinking he could b better equipped than me, we started fighting, i hit this lvl 20 with 8 dmg max, with my lvl 53 novaflow, and he hit me with around 190 to 260... later after dying, i asked him how the hell could he have that much more of uber weps then me... he told me he had lvl 50+ armors on, and a lvl 69 shotgun, i asked how he got it on, and he said he had a trader friend buff him with the highest lvl wrangler, and twinked out implants... after this i though ... **** what u can do with freinds ...
sure i got my ass whooped when i was imo uberly equipped, it didn;t piss me off, it intreged me, made me shoot for higher lvl stuff and better everything. after a day i went from 25 to 38, doing missions alone, killing everything in them mainly for xp, nothing else, up to lvl 43 (at lvl 40 i finnaly got a lvl 79 novaflow on) its starting to get tough again... sure i crit for 550
bassically the point of this is that equipping uber weps is 1 of the draws of this game, most of the people on their first characters have them all fubar'd becuase at the begginging of the game they don't know wtf to put ip's into or what to equip or what the hell their doing ...
another note on nt's i had an nt friend that, at lvl 54, could solo lvl 75 missions ... wtf do they need more of an advantage ... i can't solo lvl 60 monsters if i wanted too...
also nt's can buff themselves up real nice, with the pillows, and with implants... they don't have tank armor cause THEIR NOT TANKS... they do have nano cloaks ... same sort of idea as tank armor, but not as strong.
OK since ther are six pages of comments i might as well put something in.
On the exploit issue:
1) Give like 2 warnings then reset the character.( i think this would be far more effetive, cause people like ther characters the way they made them and this would be far more of an imbarrasment than simple being banned ei; try explaining to you rfriends why you wer level 100 yesturday and today your level 1.( that would be reaaly funny)
2) refer to number one (cant think of anything better than number one)
On the over equiping issue:
1) i thouhgt this was part of the game (the sybex guid refers to it on more than one point)
2) the clinic bug fix solved alot of the problem, and will thus level things out before to long.
3) the wrangler buff will be worthless for all except traders, and then they would become gods.
4) i like the i dea of being able to over equip my character if i invest enough time into it
5) alot of the problem seems to stim from debuffs effecting nano users as apossed to weapon usesers , so i think the effect should be to lessen the amount of damage being delt by both types of classes instead not being able to weild the nano/weapon, i think this would solve that issue all together
6) what i mean by number five is that when u are debuffed by a nano u become less effective (when your skill turn red from the effect) not when your wrangler has worn off. Other than that your weapon would work more effectivly or as it should .
7) YOU REALLY NEED TO DEFINE WHAT IS OVER-EQUIPING : everthing i have read bout this game says u should be able to do this
well thos r my thoughts
My first response is "just do a player wipe when you get these things figured out"1 Should we do a pre-emptive strike on the exploiter community?
3 How should we handle over-equipping?
No, that wouldn't be good, I've invested too much time into my character, a pwipe will push me to cancel [sooner].
My second thought was to do a item refund- where you take away all my items, and give me the cash equivlent that a vending machine would sell those items for. (eg. a peice of AL70armor that a machine would sell for 90,000creds. The item would be deleted and the player would get 90000cr.)
Along with an item refund, all IP is wiped/resetted/refunded.
I dont see whats the big deal with funcom not resetting IP. You nerf an item, you should restart the skill/refund IP for the skills related to that item's requirements. When that happens, the user should get a popup window explaining the reason for the nerf, what the nerff is, and that the IP has been refunded incase you dont want to use that weapon anymore. When the skill is resetted/IP refunded, the item is unequiped. If the user cant raise his/her skills back up to use the item because it was twinked, then tough luck- they shouldn't have twinked it to begin with- go grab a skill buff and if that doesn't work stop complaining because you cant use your uber lewt.
Just complete/create a system you like and players like. Forget about current items or effect on players. Just create a system that works.
THEN after that is acomplished, reset skills, refund IP, delete all items, refund item in $$$ according to what a vending machine would sell them for.
Problem solved.
The game just ins't fun anymore, im not sure it ever was for me.
...well that isn't completely ture.. I enjoy the newbie life (under level25)
Figure out the difference between life under level25 and life over level 35.
Figure out what makes life fun under level25 and life borring over level 35.
Then apply what ever makes life fun uncer level25 to life over 35 and you'll have a fun game. (of course there are other parts to making the game fun, but hey, its a start)
Three strikes is way too much.
Every online game has the same problem. Cheaters control the game with a ruthless greed that makes me sick. Giving three strikes to people who are worth millions within a few days simply laugh at the rules. It must be kept simple. The only exception to the rules should be maybe someone wearing/using an item slighlty ahead of his/her time. This could be a game bug and not necessarly a person who cheats. Anyone who dupes, exploits the game should have his/her account PERMANENTLY CLOSED.
This is obvious cheating and it ruins the game, its that simple.
As far as any factions/guilds that have a majority of its players cheating, well, that means that either they all are cheating or most of them are the rest have knowledge of it and are benefiting from the wealthy success of the other members, so that in my mind makes them cheaters/exploiters as well. If FunCom doesn't stop this now they never will. BAN THE FACTIONS
hmmmm
Over-Equipping ...
hmmmm...
what do you think IC, Essence & stuff was made for ???
Hardestdrugs, Doctor, 220
Tenderly, Enforcer, 215
Adacta, Bureaucrat, 220
Midshipman, Soldier, 216
A small, cute dog is called a doggy.
A small, cute girl is called a girly.
Now what do we call a small, cute Org ?
Personally I agree with everyone who says to do an IP reset and dequip everyones gear, for me PvP can be really frustrating because there is that guy who has really high ACs from getting buffed stats and equipping higher lvl gear. So to eliminate this problem, just reset all the IP, let everyone respend it, dequip all the gear and then you will have successfully and finally solved that problem!
Honestly.
It's a great idea on paper,
But the reality is, if you try to implement any of this it's going to be more massive nerfs, and generally screw around with any hope of making the game playable.
Truwind's suggestion is the only really fair one, grant an IP reset, and unequip all gear. Anything else seems to leave too many possibilities for abuse.
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