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Unused feature #1: Combat rankings
This is perhaps not unused, but certainly misused. Unfortunately, due to me not being a fighter, I can't really give much input, since the only thing I could think of was random matchups. That's not likely to work though, given the current population of Lusternia.
So I'm throwing this wide open, and odds are I won't make many more posts here.
So I'm throwing this wide open, and odds are I won't make many more posts here.
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(c) Iron Realms Entertainment 2012.
Comments
I like the idea of large arena games deciding your combat ranking though. It wouldn't solve every problem, but it would certainly be far better than what we have today.
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.
Firstly: anonymity. The aetolia system anonymizes all participants - when the duel starts, you and your opponent are assigned to be either 'red' or 'blue', and that's all you see throughout the fight. You will never know who your opponent was, unless you publicly ask for someone to own up to it (after the fight) and you can never be sure if anyone who responds is the real person. Aetolia's arena system also drops you back to whichever room you entered realm-wide events from. Ie. if I join a FFA from the Master Ravenwood, after it ends, I'll be put right back there instead of at the spectator stands. This was put in to prevent people from escaping combat via arena events, but had the added benefit of helping maintain anonymity.
We can easily integrate that into our current queue system. Add a new event type "Rankings", and when one person joins the queue for that, it gives an alert to all participants of the system that "a challenger has appeared". The next person to join the queue kick-starts the event, and you get an anonymized duel. Whether we do the drop-off thing is optional, it really doesn't matter if you know who your opponent was after the fight is over, anyway.
Secondly: Number of legitimate duels The number one reason why rankings is abused is because there aren't enough participants to keep a healthy flow of points in the rankings. A single person can farm his friends' combat ranking points, and anyone else who wants to stop them has to resort to the same tactic, or they'll never be able to do so. This will be alleviated by integrating combat rankings into the queue system, as much more people will make use of it - out of sight, out of mind, is one of the many reasons rankings don't go used. If usage is as simple as joining a queue, an established practice in Lusternia already, we will see a large jump in legitimate combatants who would wish to remain anonymous, and thus create a healthy transfer of points that can prevent a single person from farming it easily.
All that said, I want to weigh in on PvP currency. I avoided the currency thread, even though I read it, because I found it was a bad idea at best. There is little reason to award arena fights with anything other than non-combat buffs. Even H/M/E buffs fall into this category. While those people who know the quests (or have a candy box) can easily get a H/M/E buff on their own, they are nowhere as wide-spread as it is made out to be. By making arena wins give such buffs, you literally make them available to EVERYONE, because all you need to do is to find a buddy, go to an arena, and have both participants heartstop in 2 different duels to give both their buffs.
No.
Anything that has any inkling of effect on PK is bad for PvP currency. H/M/E, truefavours etc. Anything that costs credits or quest effort to achieve is bad for PvP currency. Extra crits, quest mobs etc. The only acceptable PvP currency that should be tied to arena duels is fluff and non essential RP rewards. Entry/exit lines. Ql descriptions. Anything else is bad.
PvP currency for non arena PK is even worse. We do not need more reasons to engage in mindless PK. There is enough reward in actually winning a fight as it is: the winning of the fight. Lusternia is a ROLEPLAYING game as well as a PK game. Sure, the PK is the main, but at the very least, the winners right now have the bragging rights to say "Celest kicked Glomdoring's ass". This is the reward that comes with winning a PK fight, be it domoths, quest shenanigans, wildnodes, shrine fights or whatever. To add currency that is their own end will dilute winning for your nation or faction as a reward. And no, we don't want that.
First of all, ranking would only be gained in FFA/Wargames (or similar; might be others I've forgotten about) held in the Klangratch Tournies. No points from duels.
Second, all those would be subjected to anonymisation a'la Vengeance. Could perhaps even reuse the names from there.
Third, you'd only gain points from one kill per person per RL day a'la ikon battles. So you couldn't farm it to rack up a lot of points.
Fourth, you'd only gain points if your opponent is higher than you or within 10 points of you. No points are lost if you lose, although it might prevent you from getting a point from that person during that day.
Fifth, it'd be a nice avenue to incorporate Albans original PvP currency idea; every point you get for the combat ranking also gives you one "honor" or whatever; while the combat ranking is reset every month, honor is only lost when making purchases.
Thoughts?
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Anyway, that's neither here nor there. The fact still stands that the rankings system isn't of much use with the amount of people that would be interested in it. I'd personally rather see it gone. Is there actually even a point to it beyond bragging rights for being ranked first? That said, if you're going to tie such a system to Wargames/FFAs, you might as well just go ahead and have a lottery with combat ranking points. The fact stands that there is such a thing as a weak team in Wargames and that the possibility of teaming exists in FFAs. Right now, nobody does it, because next time around they're the ones that will get teamed. Hide them behind a random name a-la vengeance and they will be doing it left and right. Add stuff like ikon/curio rewards to it and it will be happening without anonymous names too.
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.
I mean, just the term "newbie" (all by itself) implies that they know next to nothing and will flail around a bit. They are better off not-anonymous because then people are less likely to just faceplant them instantly (or, if they do, be more likely to offer advice after).
In World of Warcraft, you get someone flopping around, you don't know who they are, where they came from and whether they've been playing for all of a week or since the game opened. In Lusternia, more often than not, you have a general idea of how long a time someone's been around. You don't go calling people retarded or noobs just because they're new. Normally, I'll yell at someone if I've had to explain something more than twice, but that's just the way I am. I kind of tend to overestimate people's intelligence and get frustrated when they show that they are lacking and need things explained in the simplest way possible several times. I guess the biggest problem stems from the fact that I also expect them to be paying attention when they ask a question, rather than be daydreaming and then completely forgetting what I tried to explain.
Anyway, I kind of got carried away here. What I pretty much wanted to say was... it's more likely that someone that is known to be new will be given advice than getting bitched at for doing something the wrong way. In that kind of situation being anonymous will not do anything good for them. I'd recommend getting rid of the misconception that you can learn everything about combat in Lusternia simply through practice or trial and error. I've heard it said. I find it amusing. It is possible, but it is much faster and easier to learn if you have someone sit down and spend a couple of minutes explaining stuff than if you just try and randomly flail in an attempt to accomplish something useful.
There are many afflictions that are not self-explanatory. There are many affliction interactions that also aren't self-explanatory. Things you wouldn't be aware of by just reading skill explanations. Things you might figure out if you grab someone and start testing stuff on them... or just ask someone more experienced. It still takes communication from both sides of the fight.
Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.