Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Blackwing
is to make every interesting item profession or level based anyway.
and the camping was here ever since the eq crowd asked for static dungeons.
i am not arguing that even the semblance of balance we currently have is tremendously difficult to maintain / nurture while still catering to a diverse customer base...
but imo ao is moving away from the skill based system more and more to a class/level based system.
i would not say this trend got started with the ipr - it started with the profession dedicated patches for advs and fixers - suddenly there were class only weapons and nanos with a level req on them.
funcom has continued into this direction ever since.
there is no denying that however crude this method may be it is effective to control the spread of an item across the playerbase.
there are at least 3 classes in ao whose main function is to give and deal with damage and restricting weapons to these classes assures them somewhat of a lead in this direction.
some weapons appear that are not tied to a specific class - say the manex or the queenblade and people flock to them.
before 14.2 or so, shotguns were all the rage.
imo this is however not a problem exemplified by iprs or reroll twink chars but by a bad database were 70% or more of the usuable weapons are utter junk.
a certain amount of min maxing in a rpg cant be helped.
we have a problem because there are weapons that utterly totally destroy any other weapon of their class - yet this has nothing to do with how you spend your ip.
It does when the top weapons that aren't supposed to have wide distribution achieve exactly that. The thing that is supposed to stop those items from actually being used, once in distribution, is SKILL. But IPR negates that.
It does not matter what the condition the game is currently in. You cannot fix a problem by causing more problems. If your house is on fire, you do not run around pouring gasoline on everything. If you do the firefighters are that respond will not be able to prevent the destruction of your home, no matter how good they are
Blaming the game does not change that IPR causes damage to what fragile balance may exist. This is why no other developer will implement the instantaneous reclaimation of skill. It it makes the game they're trying to maintain too unpredidctable unless they use extreme methods to ensure some integrity in the game. They're not trying to make you play longer. They're trying to keep the game playable for everyone.
Because Funcom cannot relying on skill to prevent the widespread use of items/abilities in the game, we're force to accept marginally better items being next to impossible to aquire. And exceptional items and abilities non-existant.
IP affecting availability
Quote:
Originally posted by Kuroshio
Complete resets are further imbalancing because they further negate the expenditure of IP, which is a natural 'brake' in the process of aquiring items. A Complete Reset allows the player to aquire items or abilities with skills they would not have had if they were investing to use the item beforehand, making the aquisition process easier. And then reset those skills to use the item they may not have been able to aquire. Or would not have been able to aquire so easily.
Kuro, you keep bringing up this "availability" argument and it continues to make absolutely no sense to me.
Ask yourself this, how many Fixers currently raise MatCrea prior to getting ahold of GA? None, if they're smart.
How many Fixers use an IPR to instantly equip GA when they get it? Probably none (which single expensive skill could you completely wipe out, in order to equip GA....).
Does that mean they can never use it unless they were raising it all along? Of course not!
They go out and level for a few hours and dump all the resulting IP from their next level (maybe two) into MatCrea. Skill and IP have absolutely nothing to do with the rarity of things like GA. Nullity Sphere? Please! If you think an NT isn't gonna have this skill to use it, you're mistaken. PPPE? Again, you play a trader, you should know better. Dump the next level of IP into chemistry and POOF, you're an armorer. No IPR needed.
I do not see your supposed correlation between skills and availability.
Re: Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Kuroshio
It does when the top weapons that aren't supposed to have wide distribution achieve exactly that. The thing that is supposed to stop those items from actually being used, once in distribution, is SKILL. But IPR negates that.
I can almost sort of see where you're coming from with this argument. But as people love to point out, you get tons of IP at the high end anyway, so in many cases you wouldn't need IPR to achieve a broad range of skill.
For instance, an enforcer can level all the way 161st with a 2hb beam, camp a Queen Blade, and then max 2he in a couple levels, without even using an IPR.
What you need to point out, to strengthen your argument, is that Professions that are not good at those skills should be at a disadvantage. That disadvantage is eliminated by IPRs. An enforcer should be able to grab a Queen Balde and have the IP to "add" it to his armory. But an X3-using NT, should have a heckuva lot harder time picking it up and using it. I don't care how much IP you get in the end game, having Rifle/AS maxed and then adding 2he/Brawl should hurt a high level NT. Obviously, resetting would make it painless.
While I don't buy into your "distribution and availablilty" theories, I can see how professions that are not supposed to be good at weapons can use IPRs to continually change weapons and stay with whatever is hot. That isn't fair to those professions like enforcers and soldiers who should be able to max multiple weapons skills and have the profession-specific benefit of switching between them compared to non-weapon intrinsic professions. Of course profession-specific items are curtailing that.
Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Blackwing
is to make every interesting item profession or level based anyway.
and the camping was here ever since the eq crowd asked for static dungeons.
both of these things are the main reason I have my eyes on SWG
*edit* and more IPR will be the last nail in that coffin (if given out just do to whining on the boards)
Re: Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Yazule
both of these things are the main reason I have my eyes on SWG
*edit* and more IPR will be the last nail in that coffin (if given out just do to whining on the boards)
I can guarantee if any of the people demanding IPR here go to SWG, you'll hear their complaints there as well (at least until SOE/Verant remind people just who is boss there).
Verant has stated they will make items obsolete, especially tradeskill items (which are supposed to be the best items in the game), by making the components necessary to make them obsolete. You can bet this will be done based on how much usage an item gets and it's relative balance compared to others.
Be prepared to hear "It takes too long to reclaim skill. I want to wield a Wookie Fur Lined Lightsaber" there. At least there, you'll also get the satisfaction of hearing Verant cracking them across the skull with blunt objects until they're too concussed to remember their names without reading them floating over their heads :D
Re: Re: Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Kuroshio
I can guarantee if any of the people demanding IPR here go to SWG, you'll hear their complaints there as well (at least until SOE/Verant remind people just who is boss there).
Verant has stated they will make items obsolete, especially tradeskill items (which are supposed to be the best items in the game), by making the components necessary to make them obsolete. You can bet this will be done based on how much usage an item gets and it's relative balance compared to others.
Be prepared to hear "It takes too long to reclaim skill. I want to wield a Wookie Fur Lined Lightsaber" there. At least there, you'll also get the satisfaction of hearing Verant cracking them across the skull with blunt objects until they're too concussed to remember their names without reading them floating over their heads :D
Yeah but I know verant, they wont let it happen, what scares me about these threads on the AO boards is they are too wishy washy... only reason IPR were EVER needed was to compensate Advents for changing the color of multiwield.
Re: Re: Re: Re: but the new trend in ao
Quote:
Originally posted by Yazule
Yeah but I know verant, they wont let it happen, what scares me about these threads on the AO boards is they are too wishy washy... only reason IPR were EVER needed was to compensate Advents for changing the color of multiwield.
Actually after digging for the article on it, it was justified for the 75% of the playerbase that was about to wake up the next day and find everything they had equipped at 50% or lower effectiveness. Yeap, it was done to let the extremely large amount of the playerbase out of the trap they were in with overequipping.