You tried to lvl but missed!

[Wutto]

All i can say is --- Funcom's programmers/designers cant even find their way out of a paper bag. Its as simple as that.

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Brokenchild
If you're unaware of how to database information and analyze data at this point after 2 years of engineering, I feel pretty sorry for you, especially considering you're a CS minor. I like the part where you say yes all of these things can be done, then go on to talk about totally unrelated topics like the so called balancing issue, the so-called ability to solo... Ya might want to consider reading up on Confucius philosophy, its all about how to go on tangents and avoid the original topic since you can’t pose direct persuasive arguments against proven facts...

May i remind you once again this thread is about soldiers with over 1k attack rating missing ACE's and RM's at a rate close to 40% its quite obvious to me and everyone else that this is done in a direct open effort to slow the speed of character leveling. The other major issue is the xp reward of ACE's RM's being out of proportion to that of Vets and Masters. If something take 4 times as long to kill it should only reward the team with an extra 15% xp.

If you want to talk about how hard it is to keep people happy or how hard it is to balance a game or allow people to solo, could you possibly do that in another thread? Its already a *given* that AO is totally unbalanced, its already a *given* that half of the character classes cant solo. And honestly why should they? This is a Massively Multiplayer game, we're supposed to be playing in teams with *other* people, relying on their skills survive.

And to put in my 2 cents on the whole balancing thing: DONT, Why the heck would anyone do such a thing? Are you crazy? You'll just end up making everyone into identical characters, the reason D&D is so well done and AO isn’t is because Wizards cast the best attack spells, Clerics cast the best healing spells and Warriors hit things with 2 handed swords for massive damage. Classes like bards and rangers who can do a little of both can only do *A LITTLE* of both! They don’t excel the cleric/wizard at casting spells, nor do they excel the warrior at dealing out melee damage.

Apt name 'Brokenchild'...

D&D isn't comparable to any MMORPG on the market because the game mechanics in it are almost completely party oriented. Soloing is almost completely impossible in AD&D. Even the latest incarnation, Neverwinter Nights, acknowledges that.

Next, I wish I could find that post from Cosmik. If an Ace or Real Mean Bully is level 240 and you're level 180, what are your chances of hitting that Ace or Real Mean Bully? If your skills reflect that of a level 180 character, then your chances don't look too good.

Now answer this question: this soldier's 1k+ ATK rating... Was that self-buffed? Cause I know some soldiers with self-buffed ATK ratings in the high 900s. It might be smart for that soldier to...oh, I dunno...TANK?!? You know, accept his 40% hit rate while protecting the team that's trying things like nanoformulas to do damage.

[_______________Intra]

if you are hitting less with a higher attack rating I would report it as a bug.
They made changes to the crit check in this patch.. so maybe a bug occured when your attack rating and your chance to crit was increased.. resulting in the new crit checking making you hit less instead of crit less?

just a thought

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Intra
if you are hitting less with a higher attack rating I would report it as a bug.
They made changes to the crit check in this patch.. so maybe a bug occured when your attack rating and your chance to crit was increased.. resulting in the new crit checking making you hit less instead of crit less?

just a thought

What I gathered from his story is that this soldier with a 1k+ attack rating had starting missing the same mobs more than before.

If evades were made more effective, then more than likely this soldier with a 1k+ ATK is now outclassed by the mobs. Seeing the difference whichever shrine gives +all evades makes against mobs in a mission (takes an orange mob to even begin hitting me), a few hundred points difference in evades can now mean a lot.

I'd actually suggest that the soldier see what happens with some buffs or start thinking a little more creatively on how to make up the damage difference (Doc/Agent DoTs, NT nukes).

[________________Tium]

Originally posted by Kuroshio
I'd actually suggest that the soldier see what happens with some buffs or start thinking a little more creatively on how to make up the damage difference (Doc/Agent DoTs, NT nukes).

Self buffed, maxed skills, 200 imps blah blah blah blah.

Want to give us all some 'creative' additions to my layout?

Basicly I cannot get anymore attack rating unless constantly run with a 132, and even then I saw no difference in hit/miss ratio, only to the damage that I put out when I DID hit.

You mention Dots to make up the damage? Agent Dot's?, two ticks for a couple of hundred damage aint gonna make that big a difference bud, maybe againsed the green mobs you like to fight in your solo missions (you mentioned shrines), but not againsed mobs that you have to kill several hundred of to lvl.

And I see you mention that I should tank, well please try to realise there is something in this game called 'Aggro', it affects the team member who is doing the most damage (understand yet?) or in Brokenchilds case, the uber doc that is getting off 6 CH's and still hitting for more base damage with his bow than I could with nova (hey guess what? bow has higher base *shrug*)

So, should I use the highest aggro nano that soldiers get? (btw it dont work), or should I pump Psyc to use a ql200 aggro enhancer? (btw it dont work).

You really cant even begin to have the faintest idea of what this thread was originally about, if you did you would agree that there is a problem with hit/miss & attk rating.

But Im guessing that you have never had this problem againsed the green mobs that you fight.

/waves /flip

[________________Tium]

Originally posted by Kuroshio
Apt name 'Brokenchild'...

Feeling backed into a corner so much that you have to make a personal attack?

Grow up man.

[Vaporlok]

Aces and Real Means aren't meant to be good xp, they are meant to be an obstable that is tougher than everything else.

What is the problem?

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Toxcin


Self buffed, maxed skills, 200 imps blah blah blah blah.

Want to give us all some 'creative' additions to my layout?

Basicly I cannot get anymore attack rating unless constantly run with a 132, and even then I saw no difference in hit/miss ratio, only to the damage that I put out when I DID hit.

You mention Dots to make up the damage? Agent Dot's?, two ticks for a couple of hundred damage aint gonna make that big a difference bud, maybe againsed the green mobs you like to fight in your solo missions (you mentioned shrines), but not againsed mobs that you have to kill several hundred of to lvl.

And I see you mention that I should tank, well please try to realise there is something in this game called 'Aggro', it affects the team member who is doing the most damage (understand yet?) or in Brokenchilds case, the uber doc that is getting off 6 CH's and still hitting for more base damage with his bow than I could with nova (hey guess what? bow has higher base *shrug*)

So, should I use the highest aggro nano that soldiers get? (btw it dont work), or should I pump Psyc to use a ql200 aggro enhancer? (btw it dont work).

You really cant even begin to have the faintest idea of what this thread was originally about, if you did you would agree that there is a problem with hit/miss & attk rating.

But Im guessing that you have never had this problem againsed the green mobs that you fight.

/waves /flip

Heh...green mobs. I play a trader. Nuff said

You completely missed the point. Up until very recently, AO has been a game where brute force beat every situation in PvM (oddly enough brute force doesn't work in PvP, as a shottie wielding Doc will teach you). Nobody tried anything but 'Shoot everything that moved'. Maybe the game is starting to mature to the point where shooting everything that moves isn't as viable as before.

You might be a top of the line soldier, self-buffed, max implanted and an uber alphastrike machine. Guess what? It may not mean as much as it did before and that's a Good thing. If you're fighting mobs that require a team to beat them (and I don't see you claiming to be soloing Aces and Real Means), why is it you seem most concerned about your solo performance? Have you tried getting a trader to wrangle you during combat? Since you're hitting less (which has the downside of extending the fight) have you tried those previously worthless DoTs from Docs and Agents to see if they have any effect now? How about init debuffs on mobs (one of the few debuffs that actually work) to slow down incoming damage so you don't have to constantly worry about dragging the mob off the doc for overhealing? Crowd control nanos work on more than just adds to wipe hatelists as well.

Worry more about team performance in team situations than solo performance. Epecially after trying out different options.

Originally posted by Toxcin

Feeling backed into a corner so much that you have to make a personal attack?

Grow up man.

So it's okay for Brokenchild to go around making personal attacks but you feel he needs defending if someone turns his words around?

I am grown. If he is as well, let him defend himself on a level consistant with his age. Cause I'd hardly call the task of balancing a game like AO suitable work for my 10 year old cousin's math class

[Razorbak133]

First off, Funcom programmers and more importantly, Funcom management who makes the decision on what to add to the game and what to change, both areas need to get treatment for their drug addiction. It is probalby curable and they will be much happier and we will be too.

As for those people who were arguing about databasing/crossreferenceing/analyzing the various aspects of the game, I can say with confidence that it wouldn't be as hard as the pessimist think but I am sure it would be harder then the optimist. Why do I think it will be easier? Well, to start with, you factor in the total number of implant combinations possible, the weapons, guns, nanos and then factor in the various computations possible for teaming. Now, subtrace all the garbage crap armor, guns and nanos and you are left if a whole lot less to deal with. Now throw away the implant combinations not used or reasonable and you have even less.
So, we throw away the junk equipment from the computations and you go from say 10,000 item database to a 1,000 item database. With nanos, you can probably throw away 25% of them.

But, none of this matters and Funcom will not make any changes even if htey read this and discuss with the posters here to get direct imput. In the end, they have a saying "The right way, the wrong way, and the Funcom way".

[__________Maxtor 1-7]

first, it is possible to get mathematic equations and everything for this, but no one in their right mind would spend that much time going through every single possible combination in this game.
If you want an equation; total types of armorXqls it hasXnumber of locations armor can be placed*to the power of the number of armor types being used+1*Xnumber of weaponsXdifferent weapon qlsXall the different duel weild possibilities(the number of dualable weapons squared gives you this)Xall the buff and debuff combinationsXall the possible implant configurationsXall possible skill combinations the player could haveXthe number of proffesionsXthe number of lvlsXnumber of combinations of extras that the player may have.
This will give you the possibilities for ONE player and is still wrong because a real equation would be much more in-depth but I don't want to take the time to write it.
That number will exceed what most calculators can show and is still useless because many possibilities can be removed. That equation is also flawed because some armor types come in ql ranges (like 75-200 instead of 1-200) so a person would spend hours just getting the stats right before doing any real calculating. The equation cannot be solved without a mathematic computer and a few programers to enter all the raw data into it, and I probably missed something in it anyway. The 'garbage' happens to take up a lot of that but is still possible, so it is required.
If you still don't think that result will be too high, let me run through a simplified version for a set of Nano Armor:
9 peices; helmet, hood, coat, chest, sleeve, sleeve, gloves, pants, and boots.
It ranges from ql 75 to 200, leaving 126 different usable qualities (including 75 and 200)
So, you have 126 to the eigth power times two (for the helmet/hood), or 127,055,759,496,970,752 different possibilities for a full set. However, you might not want to equip some of the armor, with eight armor slots there are 64 combinations, 147 with the hood/helmet switching(seven slots squaredXthree). You now have 18,677,196,646,054,700,544 combinations for a SINGLE SET OF ARMOR!
You cannot get a mathematical solution in this game to remove bugs like this, there are way too many possibilities and the bug could be in something completly unrelated (like the bug with crats when they had a normal pet and charmed pet).
In order to get the possibilities including all the armor in AO, do the same thing over and over for each set and multiply them, you will also have to change the 64 to 'the number of armor slots'(seven excluding back) to the power of the 'number of armor types being used+1' (the one is for no armor). I am not going to try that btw.


Second, a simple '{attack skills divided by evade skills}X whatever percentage FC wants to put in for the chance of hitting a mob' should give you a good result instead, but FC probably tried this and still got tons of bugs. Another equation including ACs could be used to determine the actual amount of damage being done.


As you should be able to see, the bugs are so common yet so spread out that it is almost impossible to remove all of them. Even if a billion combinations of the nano armor were bugged, chances are against anyone noticing because of the huge amount of total combinations.


-edited, used the wrong formula and the result shrunk dramaticly for teams, but noone really noticed..then fixed a typo-
I think razorback is saying that there are really not that many combinations for logical and common setups, but there really are.
lets say you are in a lvl 150ish group:
12 professions, 13 possibilities for members per group slot (13 is for missing the member). You have 4,826,809 different group combinations, if everyone is at exactly lvl 150.
Chances are that your group will range from about lvl 135-165, making 31 possible lvls per group member.
Now, including lvls, the euation becomes 13X31*to the sixth power*. The result you get is 4,283,810,754,983,929 unless I did the calculation wrong, which I doubt but noone is really going to check it anyway..
There are four breed choices, three of which have a male/female option, making a total of seven choices. Doing the same thing agains but multiplying by seven before going to the sixth power gives 503,986,051,513,104,262,921 as a result, which allows for tons of bugs very early in the equation but still with reasonable possibilities. This equation is for a tiny amount of possible factors in a team. A lot of data, which I do not have, is required to go into other possibilities.


So yeah, there are bugs with the evades, but the larger ones should be fixed soon or a new equation should be put in..


And just incase anyone wanted to know; I have not gotten any degrees in mathematics (yet), and number-crunching isn't my specialty anyway.

[________________Tium]

Originally posted by Kuroshio
..Have you tried getting a trader to wrangle you during combat? Since you're hitting less (which has the downside of extending the fight) have you tried those previously worthless DoTs from Docs and Agents to see if they have any effect now?..

err, did you actually read my post?

just wondering seeing as you commented on it *shrug*

or maybe your 10 year old cousin proof read it for you

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Tox


err, did you actually read my post?

just wondering seeing as you commented on it *shrug*

or maybe your 10 year old cousin proof read it for you

Yes I did. And a single attempt at being wrangled isn't a statistical certainty. Nor does it invalidate any of the other suggestions made.

You stated that DoTs are ineffectual. If you weren't using them before and were killing mobs at x speed, now that killing that same mob is taking a bit longer could it be possible that using them would speed things up?

While I'm sure mob nanoresist has increased a bit, low resistant nanoformulas are still viable. Along with a good crowd controller to mez the mob's hatelist and restore aggro to the tank.

But if all you want to do is press 'Q' and backflip, have fun. Personally, I hope the trend continues forcing people to rely less on brute force and more on good teamwork.

[______________Masata]

We need John Nash's help with this problem. Anyone go to Princeton? Stop by and see if he wants to go into the field of MMORPGs jfnj@math.princeton.edu lol

[__________Maxtor 1-7]

Originally posted by Masata
We need John Nash's help with this problem. Anyone go to Princeton? Stop by and see if he wants to go into the field of MMORPGs jfnj@math.princeton.edu lol

I don't know who that guy is for sure, but read my post! I already went through all the math, why do you want a second opinion for what is already correct?!

[______________Masata]

He's the rather smart man that A Beautiful Mind was based on.

[__________Maxtor 1-7]

ahh, I was thinking of that as a 50/50 chance. But even he would not solve this because the limits on variables are variables themselves, like how nano armor goes from lvl 75-200 but Living Cyber Armor only goes up to lvl 50. You don't need a Noble Prize winner to tell you that, but technically an answer is possible to get (it would still be useless anyway)..

The previous solution I had for teams was only for one player, not the entire team (it was still around 17,000 though), but could include the bug. However, the total possibilities is well over 17k because I only included their profession, lvl (withinn 135-165), breed, and placement in a team. If I went through all the calculations I would exceed the maximum character limit on this board (15,000).


You can go through the equations for the nano armor and teaming possibilities yourself but still get the same result I did (as long as you use the correct formulas). I used the calculator that came with win98 btw, the same might help you if you know how to go through the problem (you would be amazed by the amount of people who don't).

[________________Tium]

Originally posted by Kuroshio
....a single attempt at being wrangled isn't a statistical certainty. Nor does it invalidate any of the other suggestions made...

Single attempt?, I'm talking about being constantly run with a 132 from the first room till boss

Originally posted by Kuroshio
But if all you want to do is press 'Q' and backflip, have fun. Personally, I hope the trend continues forcing people to rely less on brute force and more on good teamwork....[/B]

You have never seen one of our guild teams play


Well you seem adamant to not see the side of someone who has actually witnessed this phenomenon, but to make suggestions based on your view of how high level gaming really is.
Just out of curiosity, what level is your character btw?, maybe you can run a ql190+ mission with some of your friends then come post back with your findings?

[______________Ginaut]

Originally posted by Tox


err, did you actually read my post?

just wondering seeing as you commented on it *shrug*

or maybe your 10 year old cousin proof read it for you

Note, attacking the individual, not the issue.

Err correction, attacking the individual ALONG WITH the issue, lol

[Kuro]

Originally posted by Tox


Single attempt?, I'm talking about being constantly run with a 132 from the first room till boss



You have never seen one of our guild teams play


Well you seem adamant to not see the side of someone who has actually witnessed this phenomenon, but to make suggestions based on your view of how high level gaming really is.
Just out of curiosity, what level is your character btw?, maybe you can run a ql190+ mission with some of your friends then come post back with your findings?

I've been around the block myself. I love the way people think that because a mission's reward is QL 190 it means that all the mobs in the mission are level 190.

One of the community team posted that when you're facing an Ace or Real Mean you could be facing a mob who's level goes up to 240. And once the target bar reaches blood red, it's singularly useless for gauging a mobs level.

You've dismissed the usefulness of any DoTs, despite the fact that if your hit ratio (and thereby your damage output) has gone down you have to make it up in someway. So that does make me wonder what other things you've dismissed as 'trivial' because it didn't do much when hitting 'Q' was all you needed to do. Here's another question for you: You're a Soldier. Do you use Automatic Targetting?

[______________Ginaut]

History admires the wise, but it elevates the brave. - Edmund Morris

It is better to debate a question without settling it, than to settle a question without debating it. - Joseph Joubert

Love your signature, man. Deep, very deep.