04-26-2024, 01:47 PM
I don't think rebirths/Amnesias are really the problem; most of the people who are truly deadly don't seem to need them, they're getting by on sheer cracked skill. (Which is not pejorative to them, I take my hat off in envy). It's the people who AREN'T "naturally" top-tier but are trying to compete at the highest level who need to spar a ton, test a ton of builds, etc, so I think that element of this change wouldn't necessarily contribute to solving the issue.
That said I agree wholeheartedly there IS an issue, and I think the element passives idea is a really nice one from every perspective - both to help a little with this and simply because it's awesome.
Personally, though, I suspect the issue is more on the incentives end.
Competency at PVP is the absolute backbone of success in Meranthe.
Now, sure, you can manage plenty of cool things that don't touch combat... up until the point you want to engage in anything where characters disagree on the world stage. If you have any goal that involves something contentious, the way to achieve it is to win fights. Even if you're apping for abilities - while a losing ratio may help your applications, sigs also require achievements, and achievements require winning. (At the very least, not losing so often that you die before anything gets done.) Not to mention the fact that the default setting for fights, Danger 1, means you have a 1 in 6 chance of being put in a scenario where you can simply die if you lose. And this applies even to people trying to do non-combatant things; when the game is full of roving antags, going out to simply forage for ingredients or mine ore is a huge risk.
What all of this amounts to...
You end up with a rich-get-richer scenario, where individuals who are highly skilled at combat are comfortable going out and taking risks on a regular basis, accruing achievements that allow them to app for signatures to become even stronger (while still taking on enough fights where they're at numerical disadvantages to have some prominent losses). The presence of these powerful characters with high-skill players creates strong pressure on the "mid-tier" players, especially those who struggle to crack the app system and unlock sigs that would close some of the numerical gaps; these players push themselves hard to crack into the top echelon and become very performance-focused because it's their only chance to achieve any kind of victory, or keep their character alive. And below those tiers you end up with a vast group of players who are essentially priced out of the market, knowing they won't end up at a competitive level, so they try their best to avoid fighting at all.
Now, mind, I am ABSOLUTELY not blaming anybody here on an individual level. Everybody is just pursuing their own fun, and those high-skill players I refer to have worked hard to put in the time and effort to become good at this game. And antags create much-needed conflict and interest where things could otherwise lead to stagnation.
What I am pointing at is the systems. Primarily the nature of combat in particular - high-damage skills with heavy CC abilities allowing for deadly combos makes skill THE determinant of victory. I am Very Bad at fighting, but I'm playing a character who has very good stats atop a solid if not A-tier meta build - and I still nearly lost a fight the other day to a demon literally 40 RPL below me.
In an environment like this, where people are so heavily incentivized to win fights, it is inevitable that the game will become performance-obsessed.
Now, my suggestions for fixing this would probably be extremely unpopular but I'm going to say them anyway in case they spur thought:
1) Normalize the signature system. Signatures and the like with combat use should be only a small percentage better than existing public spells, with the main benefit being in fluff/RP usage. Put hard limits on the amount of coded benefits a person can accrue from signatures to stop things like insane AP stacking and root out things like damage conversion stances which allow for massive benefits under the table.
2) Standardize the app system. Design clearer rubrics for how one earns signatures for greater consistency between players. Decide once and for all how sigs should be awarded (to reward achievement? to allow weaker people who are trying to keep up? to fit IC/narrative? to enable plotlines?)
3) Consider removing/reducing a lot of CC from the game, especially roots and stuns. Yeah, I expect to get shouted out of the room for this one, but the existence of absolutely devastating combos is a huge part of what makes combat so lethally skill-based. A small advantage in ability to hit and dodge translates into a huge advantage if you're also able to lean on tools like this. Would this make combat more boring? Maybe. Would it level the playing field? Absolutely.
3) Revamp injury code. While the actual numerical penalties of a -10 perm aren't high, the morale impact can be absolutely devastating, especially for newer characters getting permed early on in fights. The suggestion put forth a while back about changing perms to basically long-standing but not PERMANENT injuries would I think be absolutely fantastic for reducing some of the perceived pressure/stakes of combat. Temps can be made to last longer and have stronger effects so combat isn't toothless, though.
4) Rethink the entire concept of cap rolls. Y'all, I cannot tell you how I stared when I found out you just roll a d6 to decide if your character gets away scott free after losing a fight or if they are put entirely in their enemy's power with no ability to do anything but, y'know, die. Putting character survival on RNG is absolutely wild. Now I will freely admit this is a really hard one to figure out. Maybe the solution is more granular terms/settings for combat beyond the big 'Aggro/Dangerous/Deadly', so people can choose if they're fighting to cap, fighting to injure, etc. Maybe the solution is policy setting the default to Dangerous 0 and requiring build-up before cap/killing as in the fated rival rules. Maybe the solution is something else entirely. But the high risk of death ensuing from even encountering a random antag in the woods is ABSOLUTELY one of the major contributors to an environment of PVP competitiveness.
There are a lot of small things that could be done to tweak the game environment, and the passives idea is a lot of fun. But ultimately, so long as PVP is the arbiter of success and survival, you will see players grow increasingly competitive until you end up with the current environment: one where the people who've developed the best skills can run the board, and everyone else has to try-hard in order to see their stories have a chance at coming to fruition.
...This turned into an essay. Yikes. THANKS FOR READING.
That said I agree wholeheartedly there IS an issue, and I think the element passives idea is a really nice one from every perspective - both to help a little with this and simply because it's awesome.
Personally, though, I suspect the issue is more on the incentives end.
Competency at PVP is the absolute backbone of success in Meranthe.
Now, sure, you can manage plenty of cool things that don't touch combat... up until the point you want to engage in anything where characters disagree on the world stage. If you have any goal that involves something contentious, the way to achieve it is to win fights. Even if you're apping for abilities - while a losing ratio may help your applications, sigs also require achievements, and achievements require winning. (At the very least, not losing so often that you die before anything gets done.) Not to mention the fact that the default setting for fights, Danger 1, means you have a 1 in 6 chance of being put in a scenario where you can simply die if you lose. And this applies even to people trying to do non-combatant things; when the game is full of roving antags, going out to simply forage for ingredients or mine ore is a huge risk.
What all of this amounts to...
You end up with a rich-get-richer scenario, where individuals who are highly skilled at combat are comfortable going out and taking risks on a regular basis, accruing achievements that allow them to app for signatures to become even stronger (while still taking on enough fights where they're at numerical disadvantages to have some prominent losses). The presence of these powerful characters with high-skill players creates strong pressure on the "mid-tier" players, especially those who struggle to crack the app system and unlock sigs that would close some of the numerical gaps; these players push themselves hard to crack into the top echelon and become very performance-focused because it's their only chance to achieve any kind of victory, or keep their character alive. And below those tiers you end up with a vast group of players who are essentially priced out of the market, knowing they won't end up at a competitive level, so they try their best to avoid fighting at all.
Now, mind, I am ABSOLUTELY not blaming anybody here on an individual level. Everybody is just pursuing their own fun, and those high-skill players I refer to have worked hard to put in the time and effort to become good at this game. And antags create much-needed conflict and interest where things could otherwise lead to stagnation.
What I am pointing at is the systems. Primarily the nature of combat in particular - high-damage skills with heavy CC abilities allowing for deadly combos makes skill THE determinant of victory. I am Very Bad at fighting, but I'm playing a character who has very good stats atop a solid if not A-tier meta build - and I still nearly lost a fight the other day to a demon literally 40 RPL below me.
In an environment like this, where people are so heavily incentivized to win fights, it is inevitable that the game will become performance-obsessed.
Now, my suggestions for fixing this would probably be extremely unpopular but I'm going to say them anyway in case they spur thought:
1) Normalize the signature system. Signatures and the like with combat use should be only a small percentage better than existing public spells, with the main benefit being in fluff/RP usage. Put hard limits on the amount of coded benefits a person can accrue from signatures to stop things like insane AP stacking and root out things like damage conversion stances which allow for massive benefits under the table.
2) Standardize the app system. Design clearer rubrics for how one earns signatures for greater consistency between players. Decide once and for all how sigs should be awarded (to reward achievement? to allow weaker people who are trying to keep up? to fit IC/narrative? to enable plotlines?)
3) Consider removing/reducing a lot of CC from the game, especially roots and stuns. Yeah, I expect to get shouted out of the room for this one, but the existence of absolutely devastating combos is a huge part of what makes combat so lethally skill-based. A small advantage in ability to hit and dodge translates into a huge advantage if you're also able to lean on tools like this. Would this make combat more boring? Maybe. Would it level the playing field? Absolutely.
3) Revamp injury code. While the actual numerical penalties of a -10 perm aren't high, the morale impact can be absolutely devastating, especially for newer characters getting permed early on in fights. The suggestion put forth a while back about changing perms to basically long-standing but not PERMANENT injuries would I think be absolutely fantastic for reducing some of the perceived pressure/stakes of combat. Temps can be made to last longer and have stronger effects so combat isn't toothless, though.
4) Rethink the entire concept of cap rolls. Y'all, I cannot tell you how I stared when I found out you just roll a d6 to decide if your character gets away scott free after losing a fight or if they are put entirely in their enemy's power with no ability to do anything but, y'know, die. Putting character survival on RNG is absolutely wild. Now I will freely admit this is a really hard one to figure out. Maybe the solution is more granular terms/settings for combat beyond the big 'Aggro/Dangerous/Deadly', so people can choose if they're fighting to cap, fighting to injure, etc. Maybe the solution is policy setting the default to Dangerous 0 and requiring build-up before cap/killing as in the fated rival rules. Maybe the solution is something else entirely. But the high risk of death ensuing from even encountering a random antag in the woods is ABSOLUTELY one of the major contributors to an environment of PVP competitiveness.
There are a lot of small things that could be done to tweak the game environment, and the passives idea is a lot of fun. But ultimately, so long as PVP is the arbiter of success and survival, you will see players grow increasingly competitive until you end up with the current environment: one where the people who've developed the best skills can run the board, and everyone else has to try-hard in order to see their stories have a chance at coming to fruition.
...This turned into an essay. Yikes. THANKS FOR READING.