Progression Past 40

We got off topic in the thread PvP balance so I wanted to start another to discuss this. We are all familiar with players including myself having characters reach 40 and simply losing interest and making new ones. While we are all free to do as we wish in this regard its clear that it has a negative impact on the RP of leadership. Our current system encourages this behavior because there is nothing to be gained past level 40. Why take your level 40 out to slay when you have another character who could really use the xp? We should have progression past level 40!

Professor Plum wrote:My objections are as follows:

• Players will get frustrated at the slow curve of 60. (As they were with 40)
  

Players want to reach 40 so they can PvP without a strong disadvantage and because of this when this process takes too long we will have frustrated players. Potential weakness in PvP is directly related to the amount of levels under 40 a character is. This however would not be the case with levels 41-60. These levels will offer small perks that may give a character a slight edge in certain circumstances. An example would be offering a few ability points which would count toward the cap. Under normal circumstances with a diverse party these stats will already be maxed so no advantage will be had unless this character is dispelled.

Professor Plum wrote:

Bonuses would have to be significant enough to make players want them, which would cause and amplify the numerous balance issues.

As long as bonuses count toward the cap or we keep them small we shouldnt run into balance issues. As a player when I really enjoy a character and roleplay them for a long time I want anything extra for them even if the advantage were only keeping spell slots from being cleared when swapping to roleplay clothing or something along those lines.

Professor Plum wrote:

We are only deferring the inevitable. People will reach 60, we will be back here again. This is not a solution.

Deferring the inevitable is exactly the solution! There is no fix that is a permanent solution. Its not like we want a player to play a character forever. Our qualm is with players reaching 40 and immediately making an alt and abandoning their 40 except for PvP. This phenomenon is completely and directly related to the cessation of progression. If we add some sort of slow progression after 40 and continue to have RP incentives I am confident we will have a working solution.

I actually really like this idea to be honest. People (myself included) have previously mentioned the greater book nerf from 5 down to 2.. now with what you said about a few stat points be able to be obtained that could potentially kill two birds with one stone here. So long as the curve from 41-60 is a steep one i think it'd be a reasonable thing to add in.

I usually stay out of these kinds of things as i don't know much about nwn when it comes to the mod part, but i figured i'd post something about my support for this i like the idea! keep some more ideas coming, i don't have any of my own at the moment but i'll think of something at some point i can throw out there i am sure.

-Rab

Ability bonuses that count towards the cap will affect everyone. It's a massive bonus.

E.G. You no longer need to wear -that- item. You can instead wear a DR item, etc.

It also buffs things, disproportionately, which are already extremely strong. Shifters, RDD's, Paladins, Blackguards, Monks (Ability-heavy builds).

There is no fix that is a permanent solution. Its not like we want a player to play a character forever. Our qualm is with players reaching 40 and immediately making an alt and abandoning their 40 except for PvP. This phenomenon is completely and directly related to the cessation of progression. If we add some sort of slow progression after 40 and continue to have RP incentives I am confident we will have a working solution.

On every RP server I've ever played, there is a large majority of people who will play a PC for years and years (RL) past the level cap.

Character progression is not limited to mechanics.

The large majority of the player base play to hit 40 and obtain gear for PvP. For no other reason. The solution, IMO, is to move away from the PvP culture and promote non-mechanical character development - instead of putting off the problem and feeding into the culture we have.

Professor Plum wrote:On every RP server I've ever played, there is a large majority of people who will play a PC for years and years (RL) past the level cap.

I just think the difference here is that no other server has the AFK xp. It doesn't matter if the person behind the keyboard has a devoted RP character, when they are not playing that character they are going to AFK some other character which they will then use for PvP purposes.

There are myriad benefits to having good RP, but I don't think it will solve the unique problem.

I agree with plum that ability bonuses are a big deal. I think they could be part of the plan though, as long as we are talking about numbers like 500k xp to get +2 to an ability. In the interval you could do skill point bonuses, possibly excluding certain skills like discipline. You could even have options that reduce one stat while increasing another, allowing players to specialize but with a cost. Warrior classes could increase AB at the expense of AC, casters might be able to choose bonus spells at the expense of a permanent damage vulnerability. Also I think any idea that improves a player's adaptability without increasing their total power is really good. Anything that will increase their PvE abilities without affecting PvP is also great.

I don't agree with the AFK xp myself.

It served its function, while the master server list was up - now it's more derogatory.

PvE is easy enough as it is!

I spent a few hours investigating the possability to raise the cap.
Sadly, it is not going to work for several reasons.
Well, technically it will work, but it won't work for us here, not in any satisfactory way anyways.
There supposedly is a way to get around the level cap on the NWserver, but we'd still have to run the server with ELC turned off and it will be nearly impossible to add new max levels without a serverwipe - to mention a few of the hardcoded issues we'd run into.
The number of reasons, in general, to NOT do this are just too many.



However, that doesn't mean we still can't have rewards based on XP beyond lvl 40.
Buffs can be added to a PC that gets to a certain XP threshold, for instance.

+1 AB, +1 AC +1 CON, +50 Temp HP after each rest, +1% Store Discount, +1 to Will save, +2 to a Skill, +1 to a Spell School's DC or maybe +2 to a specific spell's DC - to mention a few examples.
Whatever little thing really - based on class, race, gender or whatever.

Maybe start up a small conversation window when they PC gets to the XP threshold and have them pick a Perk (yes, that's what I'm calling it after my FO3 NV marathon).
Then that Perk would be permanently attached to that PC.
Then granted the PC a new Perk each time they hit a new Threshold, like each 50.000 XP or whatever.
Progress can be stored on a PC's Faction item, so it will carry over reboots.

This is all really easy to do (it will work as the Subraces do now, more or less), it won't affect balance much AND most importantly it will give players some incentive - no matter how small.

What types of buffs they can choose from, how poweful they will be and at what XP thresholds there will be, is stuff we can hammer out later.

But this is just the general idea of my suggestion.

Thoughts?

-TheMothMan

Will it keep people playing when they're capped?

Professor Plum wrote:Ability bonuses that count towards the cap will affect everyone. It's a massive bonus.

E.G. You no longer need to wear -that- item. You can instead wear a DR item, etc.

It also buffs things, disproportionately, which are already extremely strong. Shifters, RDD's, Paladins, Blackguards, Monks (Ability-heavy builds).

Disproportionate buffing is good point but I think we could counter it with the details. Perhaps only allow an ability to be perked to a max of +2. In all actuality I really dont see how these small buffs will ruin balance.

Professor Plum wrote:
On every RP server I've ever played, there is a large majority of people who will play a PC for years and years (RL) past the level cap.

Character progression is not limited to mechanics.

The large majority of the player base play to hit 40 and obtain gear for PvP. For no other reason. The solution, IMO, is to move away from the PvP culture and promote non-mechanical character development - instead of putting off the problem and feeding into the culture we have.

I hear you and I do want to make an effort shift the culture a little more toward RP but I think it best if we use mechanics along with more traditional methods. If our players really wanted a heavy/strict RP world they would have gone else where by now. For better or worse the fact is that our server is a unique mix of PvP with a side of RP. We have had our share of DMs who were going to come in and make us more RP centric but this has never panned out. That is why I prefer to use a more mechanics approach. DMs promoting RP are still required but I don't think our culture here can be shifted using only that approach.

Professor Plum wrote:Will it keep people playing when they're capped?

No but it will encourage some people to play until they are capped which we will stretch out to a very long time. No longer will people have a vault full of maxed characters. It's going to make people chose which one their favorite characters they are going to spend time on working toward the cap.

Professor Plum wrote:Will it keep people playing when they're capped?

If it is a question directed towards my suggestion; Then yes, I would think it will.

If you have that one char you are kinda inlove with and is really fun to play, but there are no more goals to achive. Everything is maxed out, Xp, Items, Gold and ATS.

At that point I think many would love to see there be a few more things to obtain for their favorite chars.

-TheMothMan

Love it moth! I would never stop playing Kat if there was more potential for gain ... I think it would exponentially lengthen the time someone puts into a specific char!

The idea is very stupid and it only has the opinions of the same persons over and over, I say throw out the entire topic... Leave things how they are now.. People remake because they realize their build is crap in PvP so they either try to make a build of their own and get to 40 for pvp or try to copy someone's build and get to 40 fer Pvp...either way that is what majority of the people on here are worried about is having a good pvp build...and adding abilities for reaching a certain xp level Is even dumber then raising the cap to lvl 60.. If you wanna do that the just remove all the stupid nerfs put on half the classes to begin with!!!! Don't do anything with this topic other then delete it..thanks...

Useful opinion.

The large majority of the player base play to hit 40 and obtain gear for PvP. For no other reason. The solution, IMO, is to move away from the PvP culture and promote non-mechanical character development - instead of putting off the problem and feeding into the culture we have.

Honestly have you EVER DMed on an anphillia server other then here DM Plum?? The solution is to move away from PVP on a server that is all about PVP??? Are you serious, like for real?? The ENTIRE point of the server is rp/PVP!!!!!!!!!!!!! The story of ANPHILLIA is TWO factions at WAR... It doesn't matter how many people have lvl 40s or when they play them, as long as RP is happening and two factions being cleaven and axfell are at war then the server is running how it's supposed to.. If you plan on changing it then do a server wipe and change the name from anphillia to something else..

Perhaps to start, you DM's/staff should encourage more people to use the forum, this way in a section labeled "General Discussion" you might actually get a few more opinions on a topic rather then just the DM's/builders of the server going back and forth with one another..OH...AND ALSO, maybe enforcing rules/etc.. such as a limit to a number of characters players can have/removing the AFK exp/ENFORCING ROLEPLAY/etc/etc/etc/etc since this seems to be "problems" that are being covered or mentioned in this topic..

umad?

Well that was difficult to read and to understand.

I believe your mistake was misinterpreting my suggestion. Which was moving to RP/PvP, away from solely PvP. RP was a focus of the majority of other Anphillias.

TheMothMan wrote:
If you have that one char you are kinda inlove with and is really fun to play, but there are no more goals to achive. Everything is maxed out, Xp, Items, Gold and ATS.
-TheMothMan

So this new system will be uncapped? Infinite rewards? (That's rhetorical, I know it won't be).

We will be at the situation we have now, only defer it alittle. Why not put all that effort into a non-mechanical reward structure, which is by its very nature is close to infinite?

No but it will encourage some people to play until they are capped which we will stretch out to a very long time. No longer will people have a vault full of maxed characters. It's going to make people chose which one their favorite characters they are going to spend time on working toward the cap.

So why don't we reduce XP gain? That amounts to the same thing - people playing characters longer.

If bonuses aren't significant enough to gain, there is no need to bother 'capping' a chracter.

If they are significant enough, then there are numerous balance implications and people will complain about the length of time it takes to reach the new cap.

If anyone has played Borderlands 2, this makes me think of Badass Rank, which is uncapped but -very- small bonuses. If you don't know what I'm talking about, look it up, I think it's a good idea.

I'unno, I think a ~10% increase to everything is pretty awesome!

I don't know, perhaps I could find interest in it either way... *shrugs*

Well as most of you know i mostly only play 1/2 chars max (Mostly because i dont tend to reach lvl 40 for some reason xD) I am mostly Rp kinda person so i would love to continue playing my char, if there are ''Rewards'' for playing your chat past lvl 40 it only gives me more drive to keep playing that which you love. These rewards dont need to be stat driven, they could also just be cosmetic improvements, just tiny extra to be able to feel that your char keeps evolving instead of staying as just another lvl 40 char wich you only use for PvP battles.

In another RP I played ages ago(5 years or so), most people had a couple accounts reach level 40. What they did besides clan PvP was either obtain items for their low level accounts(which I don't know if it is legal here) or go on "DM Quests". DM quests were basically for all levels, but relied mostly on the maxed out players. A DM quest was a stretch of the server with a variety of strong monsters to kill, and a lot of them. You don't just simply run through them, if you pull too many it's almost impossible not to die. Once you reach the end you kill a boss surrounded by his goons, and you collect your reward from the DM, which would either be gold, an item, xp, or a quest point. Accumulated quest points were used for player skins. I don't know how this RP works, so obtaining gold/item on a low level account might be illegal.

I am a fan of making a medium for characters to purchase items using experience points.

These could vary from regularly obtainable items to items unique to this medium.

There are a couple of different ways to script this but it would still be an issue of the incentives and how to make them credible without being incredible.

Totally agree!

You could even drop me a PM!