Mixed Level Grouping in MMOGs

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
G

Guest

Guest
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
and in the stories they tell one another.

It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
matter.

A battalion of totally green troops is near worthless in comparison
to a battlaion salted with veteran officers and NCOs, and the
soldiers of the completely green unit will gain effectiveness (gain
levels, as it were) FAR more slowly besides.

Send a couple of squires out in the service of veteran knights, and
send two more out in the company only of other squires. Who do you
think is going to learn more/faster about melee, those who avoid the
company of veteran mentors or those who live and travel with them?

The obsession with preventing "powerleveling" prevalent in our
community has, in this particular case, led to the creation of a
hollywierdesque insistence that we accept a notion that's self-
evidently wrong, no, wrong is too mild, spectacularly moronic is
better. I don't know who said "I'm willing to suspend my disbelief,
but I'm not willing to hang it by the neck until it's dead.", but
for me at least, it fits this particular idiocy like a glove.

Restricting the pace of level/experience gain makes sense. Giving
lower, even drasticly lower, experience awards to the _higher_ level
characters involved makes tremendous sense. Both of these reflect
what anybody with three brain cells to rub together can observe and
participate in at any time in place throughout their lives.

Honoring the twistedly self-righteous and individualistic notion
that every character must "earn" their advancement according to an
arbitrary code that denies the sum total of all human experience is
very nearly too stupid for words.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:06:59 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
wrote:

>I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>and in the stories they tell one another.
>
>It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
>or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
>else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
>and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
>really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
>matter.
[SNIP]

There's a flaw in your logic to all this: You aren't being taught by
being sent out into the field. You're being taught in the cities by
the trainers/guildmasters/whatever. A level 1 character has been
through "boot camp", and is now being sent out in the world into areas
where the threat is lower to cut their teeth. The veterans' efforts
are better spent facing the foes that pose bigger threats in the world
than running alongside a bunch of green soldiers. A green soldier
isn't going to learn much by watching a veteran cleave an orc in half
in one swing, and the veteran can't really tell him anything he didn't
learn in "boot camp".

It's clearly implied that the point in your character's life where you
pick up and start playing is where he has learned all he can in
training yards and needs actual applied experience to learn more. The
trainers can still teach them the advanced techniques when the
character is ready, but they're past the point of needing someone
standing over their shoulder and showing them how to swing their
sword, aim their bow, etc.

--
Dark Tyger

Sympathy for the retailer:
http://www.actsofgord.com/index.html
"Door's to your left" -Gord
(I have no association with this site. Just thought it was funny as hell)

Protect free speech: http://stopfcc.com/
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

kaev wrote:
> I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
> have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
> not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
> to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
> and in the stories they tell one another.
>
> It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
> or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
> else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
> and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
> really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
> matter.

Right. Because the "ignorant and unskilled" people aren't
the ones leading the work or doing the "skilled" work. An
"ignorant and unskilled" carpenter doesn't get any better,
BTW, simply by standing next to a master craftsman. He
gets better by actually doing his work.

> A battalion of totally green troops is near worthless in comparison
> to a battlaion salted with veteran officers and NCOs, and the
> soldiers of the completely green unit will gain effectiveness (gain
> levels, as it were) FAR more slowly besides.

Right. Because the "totally green troops" aren't leading the
battle. But a "totally green trooper" doesn't get any better
at aiming his rifle by being next to a skilled sharpshooter...

> Send a couple of squires out in the service of veteran knights, and
> send two more out in the company only of other squires. Who do you
> think is going to learn more/faster about melee, those who avoid the
> company of veteran mentors or those who live and travel with them?

Not a whole lot of difference, if you're going to throw them
into battle against seasoned and veteran opponents. All
the veteran knight can do is defeat his own opponent; that
veteran knight on the other side is going to quickly dispatch
the squire anyway...

> The obsession with preventing "powerleveling" prevalent in our
> community has, in this particular case, led to the creation of a
> hollywierdesque insistence that we accept a notion that's self-
> evidently wrong, no, wrong is too mild, spectacularly moronic is
> better. I don't know who said "I'm willing to suspend my disbelief,
> but I'm not willing to hang it by the neck until it's dead.", but
> for me at least, it fits this particular idiocy like a glove.

No disbelief required. You're using a false assumption...

> Restricting the pace of level/experience gain makes sense.

And there it is. "Level" has nothing to do with "learning."
You CAN learn your abilities in combat with a higher-level.
Your casting skills will go up, your offense/defense skills
will go up, etc. For lack of a better term, what will NOT
go up is your ability to lead, to act on your own against
higher-ability opponents, etc. --- that's your level. And
it won't because the higher-levels you're with are the ones
doing the work...
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:37:32 GMT, "Wolfie" <dbgbdwolf@gte.net> wrote:

>kaev wrote:
>> I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>> have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>> not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>> to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>> and in the stories they tell one another.
>>

....

>
>> Restricting the pace of level/experience gain makes sense.
>
>And there it is. "Level" has nothing to do with "learning."

Ah, the revelation. Guess I'll go back and snip everything above.
You not only buy into the idiocy, you willingly attempt to extend
it with a transparaently false statement. Thanks for trying, you
will probably do better next time if you ask somebody who has
already learned how to think coherently to give you a few pointers.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

In article <s481t0lr5g2fc3r0p40qkjef1fhb7m217v@4ax.com>,
darktiger@somewhere.net says...
> On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:06:59 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
> wrote:
>
> >I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
> >have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
> >not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
> >to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
> >and in the stories they tell one another.
> >
> >It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
> >or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
> >else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
> >and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
> >really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
> >matter.
> [SNIP]
>
> There's a flaw in your logic to all this: You aren't being taught by
> being sent out into the field. You're being taught in the cities by
> the trainers/guildmasters/whatever. A level 1 character has been
> through "boot camp", and is now being sent out in the world into areas
> where the threat is lower to cut their teeth. The veterans' efforts
> are better spent facing the foes that pose bigger threats in the world
> than running alongside a bunch of green soldiers. A green soldier
> isn't going to learn much by watching a veteran cleave an orc in half
> in one swing, and the veteran can't really tell him anything he didn't
> learn in "boot camp".
>
> It's clearly implied that the point in your character's life where you
> pick up and start playing is where he has learned all he can in
> training yards and needs actual applied experience to learn more. The
> trainers can still teach them the advanced techniques when the
> character is ready, but they're past the point of needing someone
> standing over their shoulder and showing them how to swing their
> sword, aim their bow, etc.

I agree.

I think there is a suspension of disbeleif in play, that 'at some point
in your life you must go out into the world and wrestle new knowledge
from it with your own two hands because you've learned all that we can
teach you'... and in EQ the premise is that point is at level 1.

Now, of course, in a mmog every other player in the game is presented
the same 'adventure', and as soon as even one of them supercedes you,
you can 'learn from them' instead of 'learning it for yourself', but it
undermines the premise that you and your peers must go out into the
world and conquer it... if 70th level titans are roaming around, holding
your hand, teaching you to slay everything from kobold runts to dragon
kings... and so it is discouraged via the mechanics.
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 15:58:57 -0800, Dark Tyger
<darktiger@somewhere.net> wrote:

>On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:06:59 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
>wrote:
>
>>I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>>have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>>not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>>to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>>and in the stories they tell one another.
>>
>>It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
>>or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
>>else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
>>and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
>>really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
>>matter.
>[SNIP]

(caveat: Parts of this post may read as insulting, even though this
is the fourth draft. Please, if you would, resist the urge to
interpret them that way, as it is not my intent to be insulting.)

>
>There's a flaw in your logic to all this: You aren't being taught by
>being sent out into the field. You're being taught in the cities by
>the trainers/guildmasters/whatever.

That's an arbitrary and false distinction. Translating your example
into the realm of personal experience, you are claiming that a new
engineering graduate is not being taught when he is mentored on the
job by an experienced engineer after he is "sent out into the field".
I can assure you that it is simply not possible to make any statemnt
more false than that.

> A level 1 character has been
>through "boot camp", and is now being sent out in the world into areas
>where the threat is lower to cut their teeth. The veterans' efforts
>are better spent facing the foes that pose bigger threats in the world
>than running alongside a bunch of green soldiers. A green soldier
>isn't going to learn much by watching a veteran cleave an orc in half
>in one swing, and the veteran can't really tell him anything he didn't
>learn in "boot camp".

Armies that believe that have lost battles and wars with depressing
regularity throughout history. Also, it's worth noting that you are
seriously oversimplifying the relationship between veteran and green
trooper with your rather contrived example.

>
>It's clearly implied that the point in your character's life where you
>pick up and start playing is where he has learned all he can in
>training yards and needs actual applied experience to learn more. The
>trainers can still teach them the advanced techniques when the
>character is ready, but they're past the point of needing someone
>standing over their shoulder and showing them how to swing their
>sword, aim their bow, etc.

To learn from experience requires that you survive the experience
and that you recognize at least part of what was done right and what
was done wrong. Having a knowledgeable and experienced mentor right
there on the spot not only makes both of these more likely to be
true, but also makes it highly likely that the latter will involve a
much more complete understanding.

Look at how people learn, and don't make the mistake of equating
learning with books and controlled/contrived situations (which
you did in your first paragraph but avoided thereafter). Well
trained armies sustain their excellence by mixing experience in
at a very low level. Infantry fireteams and squads, for example,
aim for 4 - 10 soldiers per NCO depending on the army and the
circumstances under which units are being formed. Elite units
are by no means strictly veteran except in rare cases. Master
plumbers take apprentices on the job with them to learn, they
don't send them out on their own. This same pattern repeats
itself anywhere and everywhere.

I had hoped to end up in a discussion of possible game mechanics
that could allow a more realistic grouping environment. I would
like to believe that the "sorta like youth sports but we ban the
coaches from the arena" approach does not have such a powerful
vice-grip on people's emotions that it cripples their perception
and imagination. I suppose the competitive attitude brought to
the community by the so many of the players has a lot to do with
that.

So many people obsess over the notion that "it's not right for
Joe Levelone to get any credit for anything that Jane Levelninety
has anything to do with". And that whole idea is, to my mind,
wrong on multiple levels. I am just astonished at how accepting
people are of the ass-backwards notion that Graeme Leveleighteen
will learn nothing by watching, emulating, and being criticized
by Bob Leveltwentyfive, yet meanwhile Bob Leveltwentyfive will
not have his learning impeded by the constant distraction of
mentoring Graeme. Take a minute and think about it. It's
completely asinine.

It doesn't help any, from my perspective, that this whole thing
appears to be deeply rooted in the sort of childish jealousy I am
constantly having to help my children abandon ("No fair! I had
to kill every last Orc with my bare hands and teeth! Uphill both
ways! Plowing through 5-foot snowdrifts under the blazing desert
sun!" ... "What! You had teeth!?!?!?").

You should be able to improve faster in the company of stronger
characters, not spectacularly faster (because it would be cruel
to make all but a randomly chosen few of the character population
progress as slowly as they ought to without mentors), but faster
none-the-less, _assuming_ that appropriate content is chosen.
Likewise, the mentor(s) in the group should suffer significantly
slowed progress (if they aren't making the effort to teach you're
not likely to get much educational benefit from the association).

Sure, many quests should look askance at ringers in the questing
group or ramp up the difficulty of the quest, "divine" tests
certainly ought to have that character to them.

Rather than remaining permanently hung-up on repressing power-
leveling, games ought to manage mixed level groups in a positive
and rewarding fashion just as they do with similar level groups.
Give the players useful choices to make, benefits and drawbacks
to balance. Focus on fun, social interaction, and entertainment,
rather than dour pseudo-righteousness. Repression is never any
fun for anybody except those who take a sad, cruel, satisfaction
in being prudes of one sort or another.

Any mixed level group should tend to become a similar level group
over time. Current "wisdom", i.e. existing game mechanics, shows
what happens when selfish, envious, and ultimately non-sensical,
emotional reactions are allowed to dictate bad design decisions.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 01:43:04 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
wrote:

>>[SNIP]
>
>(caveat: Parts of this post may read as insulting, even though this
>is the fourth draft. Please, if you would, resist the urge to
>interpret them that way, as it is not my intent to be insulting.)

"I'm going to start off my reply with blatant spin-doctoring and
mis-representation of an activity that's commonly viewed as common
courtesy."

It's called trimming the chafe. I'm responding to the post overall and
not going to dissect it point by point like an obsessive child.

You're assuming that the game is plopping us all into some kind of
military by default. It's -NOT-. This is left vague to give us the
freedom to choose this for ourselves. While there are organized
societies, it's up to the individual whether we belong to them or not.
These societies will, however, train freelance adventurers.

If you want to roleplay having a mentor help you along the way, by all
means, find someone who's willing to do that with you. Nobody,
however, is going to be forced into this and it is as it should be.

There's a reason that the quests and such given to level 1 characters
don't involve charging into raid level encounters. We're being given
challenges that we can handle to harden us for the greater challenges
ahead. We're going out into "safe" territory to fight weaker foes and
it's close to home where we can return to the trainers and there are
guards who can bail us out if need be.

There, there's your veterans watching over your shoulder.

--
Dark Tyger

Sympathy for the retailer:
http://www.actsofgord.com/index.html
"Door's to your left" -Gord
(I have no association with this site. Just thought it was funny as hell)

Protect free speech: http://stopfcc.com/
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 01:43:04 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
wrotC😀RIVE_E

>Any mixed level group should tend to become a similar level group
>over time. Current "wisdom", i.e. existing game mechanics, shows
>what happens when selfish, envious, and ultimately non-sensical,
>emotional reactions are allowed to dictate bad design decisions.

Actually, the design decisions are very good. You are attempting to
apply real-world thinking to an extremely abstract simulation. It's
akin to complaining about the fact Monopoly does not provide a good
model of real-estate development or that Chess is not a historically
accurate recreation of medeival warfare. ("What do you mean, a Pawn
becoems a Queen simply by crossing the board? In what genuine medieval
battle did any peasant soldier become elevated to the nobility -- and
changed in gender -- merely by reaching some arbitrary point on the
field? This is idiotic game design!")

The controls on leveling, etc, in online games are there because of
*sound* game design -- and a large part of sound game design is
knowing when to tell 'realism' to ah heck off. In my experience, those
sounding the clarion call of 'realism' simply wish to make things
easier for themselves -- very rarely do I hear demands for realistic
rules for encumbrance, the effects of wounds and fatigue, the need to
eat and sleep, the problems of boredom when asked to stand in the same
spot for hours waiting for a rare spawn...

Newbie PLAYERS learn from experienced PLAYERS exactly as you describe
-- a new player whose fifth level character is grouped with a very
experiened players 5th level character will learn a very great deal
about grouping, tactics, monster toughness, game etiquette, and so on,
just as you argue. That's the real world learning where a genuine
mentor teaches a genuine apprentice. In term of game stats, however,
his CHARACTER only improves by facing challenges appropriate to his
level, for sound game design reasons, and if he was credited with
'experience' gained when SirHighLevel rips through a thousand
monsters, it would be grossly wrong and the pinnacle (or depth) of
poor game design. The nature of game systems makes awarding experience
'per kill' impossible -- what happens to the healers or other utility
characters who never kill but who make others capable of killing? So
the 'group' gains experience, not any individual character -- this, it
is always going to be the case that if your system were implemented, a
low-level character would not even need to participate in a fight to
'learn' from it -- utter bollocks.

Frankly, this sounds like a test balloon. "How can I justify rampant
power levelling in way that doesn't sound like I just want to PL all
my alts in a week? Hmmm...let's see if anyone buys THIS argument!"
Nope. Not buying it. Try again.
*----------------------------------------------------*
Evolution doesn't take prisoners:Lizard
"I've heard of this thing men call 'empathy', but I've never
once been afflicted with it, thanks the Gods." Bruno The Bandit
http://www.mrlizard.com
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

kaev wrote:
> On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:37:32 GMT, "Wolfie" <dbgbdwolf@gte.net> wrote:
>
>> kaev wrote:
>>> I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>>> have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>>> not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>>> to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>>> and in the stories they tell one another.
>>
>>> Restricting the pace of level/experience gain makes sense.
>>
>> And there it is. "Level" has nothing to do with "learning."
>
> Ah, the revelation. Guess I'll go back and snip everything above.
> You not only buy into the idiocy, you willingly attempt to extend
> it with a transparaently false statement. Thanks for trying, you
> will probably do better next time if you ask somebody who has
> already learned how to think coherently to give you a few pointers.

Try looking up 'ad hominum' and come back when you can
make some argument on the issues...
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

In article <41d08e3f.5925740@news.visi.com>, kaev wrote:
> It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish, or farm,
> or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything else, by
> getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together and refusing to
> work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a really stupid thing to
> do if you have any choice at all in the matter.
>
> A battalion of totally green troops is near worthless in comparison to a
> battlaion salted with veteran officers and NCOs, and the soldiers of the
> completely green unit will gain effectiveness (gain levels, as it were)
> FAR more slowly besides.

Yet sometimes circumstances force that to happen. Consider aviators in
World War I, for example. There were often units going out without any
seasoned veterans...just pilots who had never even been in a plane a month
earlier. (Yeah...they didn't last long. The average lifetime of a pilot
was something like a month or two).

Weren't a lot of the units on D-Day in World War II pretty much green, too?

Or how about the Civil War?

Of course in all of these, they tried to mix in experienced people with the
green people, but I think there were many cases where there just weren't
enough experienced people to go around. (And sometimes, like in the case of
the WWI aviators, the experiences people weren't all that experienced).

Anyway, I think you've overlooked that in a fantasy MMORPG, we want to
pretend that we are doing things that haven't been done. When we go to kill
a dragon in a dungeon, we pretend that this isn't a dragon that respawns
every 12 hours and has been killed thousands of times before we got there.
Our party is supposed to be the first to dare venture into the lair and take
on the dreaded beast...so there aren't supposed to be any salted veterans to
tell us how to handle a dragon.

I've always imagined it goes like this. At low level, in the newbie area,
we've had our basic training, and now we are out in the newbie area
practicing. The guards are around to save us if we get in over our heads,
and they are giving us tips and lessons (which is not shown in-game).

Meanwhile, and not shown in-game, our characters have been going out on
hunting trips and patrols with slightly higher level characters, learning.
So, in EQ1 terms, if we are in Freeport, we've been out on numerous Orc
patrols to East Commons and Northern Ro.

When we venture to EC or NRo in-game to actually take on the Orc camps with
other players of our level, that represents our character having done enough
training and pratice on those patrols that he is ready to go out on his own.

--
--Tim Smith
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:06:59 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
wrote:

>I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>and in the stories they tell one another.
>
>It is tremendously ineffective to try and learn to hunt, or fish,
>or farm, or duel, or soldier, or engineer, or build, or do anything
>else, by getting a group of ignorant and unskilled people together
>and refusing to work with craftmasters and veterans. It's just a
>really stupid thing to do if you have any choice at all in the
>matter.
>
>A battalion of totally green troops is near worthless in comparison
>to a battlaion salted with veteran officers and NCOs, and the
>soldiers of the completely green unit will gain effectiveness (gain
>levels, as it were) FAR more slowly besides.
>
>Send a couple of squires out in the service of veteran knights, and
>send two more out in the company only of other squires. Who do you
>think is going to learn more/faster about melee, those who avoid the
>company of veteran mentors or those who live and travel with them?

I've never played City of Heroes, but I read something in a review a
while back about heroes being able to have "sidekicks", lower level
players who actually were more powerful as long as they were with
their mentor. I think the idea was exactly this sort of "take a
student under your wing" approach. I'm not sure whether this is
actually something that is in CoH, or whether this is just something
that they were contemplating implementing... maybe someone who has
played CoH can comment?
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

In article <2ro1t0ho3bjs061a6jsn7hvb55vg8ltekm@4ax.com>, murdocj
<murdocj@hotmail.com> wrote:
> I've never played City of Heroes, but I read something in a review a
> while back about heroes being able to have "sidekicks", lower level
> players who actually were more powerful as long as they were with
> their mentor. I think the idea was exactly this sort of "take a
> student under your wing" approach. I'm not sure whether this is
> actually something that is in CoH, or whether this is just something
> that they were contemplating implementing... maybe someone who has
> played CoH can comment?

CoH's sidekick system is an attempt to address what I call the varible-
advancement-rates problem of MMORPG design.

The problem is that different people will progress in the game at
different rates, depending on their skill, free time, vacations, etc.
The tendency, therefore, is for friends to find themselves unable to
group together because their characters' levels are too far apart.

In CoH, any character of level 10 or higher may temporarily appoint
another lower-level character as a sidekick. So long as the sidekick
remains reasonably close to his mentor, he is effectively one level
lower than the mentor--his hitpoints, chance to hit, and so forth are
boosted. The sidekick receives experience proportional to his actual
level for fighting mobs at his effective level. For example, the level
10 sidekick of an level 50 character will gain experience for killing a
level 49 mob as if he had killed a level 10 one.

Sidekicking is temporary; you do it for a play session, not on a
permanent basis.

The upshot is that if you're level 30, you can sidekick your level 20
friend and play with him. You can also reverse-sidekick, dropping your
effective level to 20.

It's a decent system. Not perfect by a long shot, but a fair sight
better than what anyone else has to offer. I give the CoH devs major
kudos just for trying to address the problem.

- Damien
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

I don't have a wide experience with MMOGs, but in EQ1, I think you're
talking about a relatively minor problem.

If you could only group with people your level, you'd have a point. But
instead the game allows you to group with a range of people, anywhere
from about 2/3rds your level to about half again your level (I once had
the actual ratios figured out, but its been a while), and wider range
than that at the extreme low end.

At level 1 you can go out and get exp in groups up to level 6; think
about it, that guy is 6 times your level! If you're killing level 3
mobs, two levels above your head and two beneath his, you can both get
decent exp and both be useful. But you could equally well choose to
kill level 1 mobs, where he doesn't get any of the exp, or level 8 mobs
where you're of no help at all; you get exp either way, learning from
the seargent. While your exp per kill is lower than it would be if
grouped with someone the same level as yourself, your kill rate should
be much higher, so you make up in volume what you lose in per kill.

At level 40 you can group up to 60, I recall that being a big turning
point back when 60 was the highest level; you could group with almost
anyone! Again, depending on what content you pick, the high level may
or may not be getting exp, but you will, and you may or may not be of
any real help, but you will still get exp.

Salting a green unit with veterans is like salting some level 2s with a
4 or 5, putting them in with a level 20 would be like grouping a bunch
of privates's straight out of boot camp with a lieutenant; he's not
really going to be a lot of help in what they need to know, which is how
to keep their asses down while crawling from ditch to ditch. They'd be
better off paired with PFC's or maybe a corporal.

Having dismissed of two arguements, I'll grant you a third; its
inconvenient to players to have restrictions on who they can group their
characters with. This is where the COH system I've seen described seems
like an elegant solution; by sidekicking, they make it possible for
anyone to group with their friends and be useful and meaningful, without
being disporportionately rewarded.

Another idea might be to change the exp system, so that instead of
giving you exp per kill, you instead get exp for what you contributed.
Trouble is, thats hard to measure, as the best contributions the low
level guy is going to provide are probably not in terms of hp damage
done, but in heals or buffs or CC or single pulling... which is why the
current system is fair, everyone is treated equally regardless of the
type of contribution they made, and the more effective each person is,
the better your kill rate so the better the exp pie thats being split up.

How about this; we stop giving generic exp, and instead set up a system
whereby exp comes in different flavors based on level of mob; you need
to kill 20 level 1 mobs to get to level 2, and 20 level 2 mobs to get to
level 3, etc. Group with a level 6 in order to take down level 6 mobs?
Great. Kill 20 of them, you're still level 1. But once you've hit
level 6, ding, you're level 7, because you already have the 20 level 6
kills under your belt. Clearly this system would need a lot of tweaking
to make it work, but perhaps there's something to the idea.

Lance
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

kaev <foreverspam@lamenames.net> wrote:
> <darktiger@somewhere.net> wrote:
>>
>>It's clearly implied that the point in your character's life where you
>>pick up and start playing is where he has learned all he can in
>>training yards and needs actual applied experience to learn more. The
>>trainers can still teach them the advanced techniques when the
>>character is ready, but they're past the point of needing someone
>>standing over their shoulder and showing them how to swing their
>>sword, aim their bow, etc.

> To learn from experience requires that you survive the experience
> and that you recognize at least part of what was done right and what
> was done wrong. Having a knowledgeable and experienced mentor right
> there on the spot not only makes both of these more likely to be
> true, but also makes it highly likely that the latter will involve a
> much more complete understanding.

I'm not sure what you're aiming at. There isn't a problem to ask higher
level players about their experiences and/or hints.

> Look at how people learn, and don't make the mistake of equating
> learning with books and controlled/contrived situations (which
> you did in your first paragraph but avoided thereafter). Well
> trained armies sustain their excellence by mixing experience in
> at a very low level. Infantry fireteams and squads, for example,
> aim for 4 - 10 soldiers per NCO depending on the army and the
> circumstances under which units are being formed. Elite units
> are by no means strictly veteran except in rare cases. Master
> plumbers take apprentices on the job with them to learn, they
> don't send them out on their own. This same pattern repeats
> itself anywhere and everywhere.

The military example isn't the best one I think. After all elite units
will die as easily as novice soldiers when hit. In an MMOG higher levels
nearly can't die when facing a low level foe. As an example just imagine
your group of youngsters attacking an Orc camp. They will be hard
pressed to survive and have to learn how to work efficiently as a group.
Add one lvl70 to that group as mentor and it's pointless. He could stay
in the camp and go afk. Even if the orcs would attack him they didn't
stand a chance to kill him! The only way to counter that would be a game
mechanic where all mobs are adjusted to match the attacker. So when orc
chieftain tries to hit our lvl70 leader it will quad 1k+ and when
turning to bash the tiny lvl10 wizard in the back he attacks with 15+
hits. I prefer the current system though!

Therefore the training should be outside of actual combat and through
talking about it. There is alot of knowledge a high level player can
share with newbies. But using the higher level player as an anvil for
smiting foes does not work.

The other point you did mention were tradeskills. Again talking to more
experienced crafters can give you more insight on how to advance faster.
That this talking is substituted by checking on websites outside the
game does not make this point invalid. You benefit from crafters that
found it out before you.

> You should be able to improve faster in the company of stronger
> characters, not spectacularly faster (because it would be cruel
> to make all but a randomly chosen few of the character population
> progress as slowly as they ought to without mentors), but faster
> none-the-less, _assuming_ that appropriate content is chosen.
> Likewise, the mentor(s) in the group should suffer significantly
> slowed progress (if they aren't making the effort to teach you're
> not likely to get much educational benefit from the association).

Why do I think you describe exactly how EQ works? After all you can have
quite a large level difference in groups. A lvl70 could group with a
lvl47. And if they do attack foes appropriate for the lvl47 advancement
for the lvl70 would be painstakingly slow. And it would be pointless the
other way around as the lvl47 can't contribute to the lvl70.

Last I'm really interested what you propose. After all everything I've
read so far is just that this mechanic is dumb, moronic or whatever.


Hagen
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

murdocj wrote:

> I've never played City of Heroes, but I read something in a review a
> while back about heroes being able to have "sidekicks", lower level
> players who actually were more powerful as long as they were with
> their mentor. I think the idea was exactly this sort of "take a
> student under your wing" approach. I'm not sure whether this is
> actually something that is in CoH, or whether this is just something
> that they were contemplating implementing... maybe someone who has
> played CoH can comment?


Playing CoH now. And yes, it exists, pretty much as you describe it.
One thing to note is that the lower leveled character isn't as powerful as
the mentor. They are SK'ed to one level lower than the mentor, they don't
have any access to any of the higher level powers they would have at their
"real" higher level, and they don't have as many augmentation slots that
enhance their powers that a higher level person would have. I've been SK'd
many, many times by as many as 30 levels, and I can tell you that I felt
pretty gimp in comparison to the rest of the party.

Also, it should be noted that experience gained scales down. Taking
totally made up numbers, let's say that it takes me 1000 exp for me to
level from level 10 to 11. And even con kill, soloed, gives me 25 exp. An
even con kill, in a group of say 4 others who are the same level as me,
gives 10 exp (did I say these numbers are totally made up? I'm not so good
at remembering real numbers like this!). Let's say I am SK'd into a group
of 4, and they are around level 30. A level 30 in the group might be
making 50 exp per kill, but my exp would be scaled back to the 10 exp I'd
get in a liked leveled group.

This means a couple of things. One, I can play with my friends, and
have fun with them, regardless of what level I am. My performance suffers
somewhat in a grouping situation when I do, and I don't get vast amounts of
"free" experience for joining a higher leveled team. I do get good
experience, because at higher levels characters in CoH tend to just mow
through mobs of mobs. But... I know I to a degree holding the team back a
bit by being there, and I'm sure the team knows it as well. They invite me
because they like having me around, and are willing to put up with the
lowered efficiency I bring to the table. I don't think that random groups
of higher leveled characters are particularly eager to mentor random lower
leveled characters just for the hell of it.

I really don't see why fantasy based MMORPG's don't adopt a similar
device to allow mixed level grouping. If it were in place, I know that I
for one would probably have played EQ for longer than I did, maybe still be
playing now.

--
Annie

In EQII:

Unsubscribed

AGE EverQuest Live FAQ:
http://www.icynic.com/~don/EQ/age.faq.htm

Mirrored at:
http://webpages.charter.net/lenny13/age.faq.htm

http://www.derfy.net/agefaq.html

_______

If you can't figure out my email address, you're not supposed to write me.
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev) wrote in news:41d0a83c.12579348
@news.visi.com:
> So many people obsess over the notion that "it's not right for
> Joe Levelone to get any credit for anything that Jane Levelninety
> has anything to do with". And that whole idea is, to my mind,
> wrong on multiple levels. I am just astonished at how accepting
> people are of the ass-backwards notion that Graeme Leveleighteen

Nineteen :b

--
On Erollisi Marr in <Sanctuary of Marr>
Ancient Graeme Faelban, Barbarian Prophet of 69 seasons

On Steamfont
Graeme, 19 Dwarven Shaman, 17 Scholar
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

"kaev" <foreverspam@lamenames.net> wrote in message
news:41d08e3f.5925740@news.visi.com...
>
> I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
> have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
> not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
> to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
> and in the stories they tell one another.

People learn by doing. In most "PL" situations like you're going to
describe, the person being PL'ed does very little "doing" and a lot of
"watching".

> A battalion of totally green troops is near worthless in comparison
> to a battlaion salted with veteran officers and NCOs, and the
> soldiers of the completely green unit will gain effectiveness (gain
> levels, as it were) FAR more slowly besides.

Likewise, a soldier standing on the deck of a battleship learns very
little about armed combat as the battleship destroys his foes at a distance.
You seem to be describing people of similar, but different levels grouping -
a mechanic that is in current MMORPGs.

> Send a couple of squires out in the service of veteran knights, and
> send two more out in the company only of other squires. Who do you
> think is going to learn more/faster about melee, those who avoid the
> company of veteran mentors or those who live and travel with them?

Assuming they survive, I think whichever group spends more time fighting
will learn more. As another poster pointed out, the tricks that a combat
veteran could impart on a green soldier are most like the advice a veteran
player could tell a new player. They help make a player better, but they
don't mean squat until put to practice learning how things really are.

> The obsession with preventing "powerleveling" prevalent in our
> community has, in this particular case, led to the creation of a
> hollywierdesque insistence that we accept a notion that's self-
> evidently wrong, no, wrong is too mild, spectacularly moronic is
> better. I don't know who said "I'm willing to suspend my disbelief,
> but I'm not willing to hang it by the neck until it's dead.", but
> for me at least, it fits this particular idiocy like a glove.

The idiocy is in the analogy. You're taking players of such different
levels that they cannot group together, and assuming that they would use the
exact same methods to achieve victory so the greener person can learn from
the veteran. A young wizard would learn nothing from a quadding wizard given
that the young wizard can't snare. A young cleric would learn nothing from a
veteran cleric given the vet is using a method, CH healing, that the
youngster cannot replicate. To use your warfare analogy, a guy with a rifle
isn't going to learn how to be better with his rifle by watching the company
machinegunner mow down enemies - nor will he learn by being on the deck of
that battleship.

James
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

In article <2ro1t0ho3bjs061a6jsn7hvb55vg8ltekm@4ax.com>, murdocj wrote:
> I've never played City of Heroes, but I read something in a review a while
> back about heroes being able to have "sidekicks", lower level players who
> actually were more powerful as long as they were with their mentor. I
> think the idea was exactly this sort of "take a

Right. Basically, if X is Y's sidekick, X's effective level is boosted to
near Y's. I don't believe X gets more HP, so X is still pretty weak, but
his to-hit chances are boosted, so that he can hit the bad guys, and he
casts his spells as if he were really the boosted level. This boost for
spells works well in CoH because in that game, you keep using your early
spells all through your career. It's not like EQ where you get higher level
spells that tend to replace the lower level spells (e.g., in EQ, my 61
Wizard casting the level 1 nuke will do exactly as much damage as a level 4
Wizard casting the level 1 nuke, whereas in CoH, a level 40 casting the
first nuke in a given line would do way more damage than a level 4 casting
that same nuke).

I believe XP is also split as if you are at the boosted level, and then
scaled back. So, if you are a sidekick in a high level group fighting stuff
that is an even con to the group, you'd get about as much XP as if you were
in a group of your level fighting stuff that is an even con to that group.

They also have something that is kind of the opposite of sidekicks, I
believe. Instead of X getting boosted to near Y's level, Y can get dropped
down near X's level. So, your high level friend can join you and help you
on your low level mission this way.

I don't recall the details, but Mythic borrowed this idea from CoH and added
something similar to DAoC. I don't think you actually become a sidekick
there, but rather, I *think* it is automatic if you have someone in the
group who is below the normal grouping limits. So, basically, they get the
boosted to-hit. DAoC spells are more like EQ1 spells, so I don't think
casters would benefit as much as they do under the CoH system, but it works
for melee, and I'd guess it works reasonably for healing classes.

--
--Tim Smith
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

Tim Smith <reply_in_group@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
] Yet sometimes circumstances force that to happen. Consider aviators in
] World War I, for example. There were often units going out without any
] seasoned veterans...just pilots who had never even been in a plane a month
] earlier. (Yeah...they didn't last long. The average lifetime of a pilot
] was something like a month or two).

WW 1 was also when combat fighter pilots came into being. There were
no such jobs before then. Then in WW2, they airforces that had
single wing fighters smashed the airforces that had old biplanes.

] Weren't a lot of the units on D-Day in World War II pretty much green, too?

Lots of mostly green units with a few combat veterans. Very few.

The major increase in military units in the U.S. after December,
1941, made it certain many units would be over 90 percent green
troops.

Nations also found out officers who were good in garrison filling
out reports may or may not work out in combat.

] Or how about the Civil War?

Same thing. The Henry repeating rifle was in use by some units. They
decimated those who attacked them.

] Of course in all of these, they tried to mix in experienced people with the
] green people, but I think there were many cases where there just weren't
] enough experienced people to go around. (And sometimes, like in the case of
] the WWI aviators, the experiences people weren't all that experienced).

True.

] I've always imagined it goes like this. At low level, in the newbie area,
] we've had our basic training, and now we are out in the newbie area
] practicing. The guards are around to save us if we get in over our heads,
] and they are giving us tips and lessons (which is not shown in-game).

I've noticed a few people skipping the tutorial... then they run
into the zombie or skeleton outside Qeynos, and their first level
toon gets smashed. Then they squawk for help with the tough
monsters.

JimP.
--
http://www.linuxgazette.net/ Linux Gazette
http://blue7green.drivein-jim.net/ December 4, 2004
http://www.drivein-jim.net/ October 24, 2004:
http://crestar.drivein-jim.net/new.html Dec 5, 2004 AD&D
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

"Wolfie" <dbgbdwolf@gte.net> wrote:
] Right. Because the "ignorant and unskilled" people aren't
] the ones leading the work or doing the "skilled" work. An
] "ignorant and unskilled" carpenter doesn't get any better,
] BTW, simply by standing next to a master craftsman. He
] gets better by actually doing his work.

No. The unskilled carpenter gets better by being told by the master
carpenter what the unskilled carpenter is doing wrong. Just doing
carpentry, with no feedback, doesn't mean the unskilled carpenter
will learn anything, except if they keep cutting off fingers they
will find the job more difficult.

JimP.
--
http://www.linuxgazette.net/ Linux Gazette
http://blue7green.drivein-jim.net/ December 4, 2004
http://www.drivein-jim.net/ October 24, 2004:
http://crestar.drivein-jim.net/new.html Dec 5, 2004 AD&D
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 20:18:16 GMT, "James Grahame"
<jamesgrahame@shaw.ca> wrote:

>
>"kaev" <foreverspam@lamenames.net> wrote in message
>news:41d08e3f.5925740@news.visi.com...
>>
<snip>
> The idiocy is in the analogy. You're taking players of such different
>levels that they cannot group together, and assuming that they would use the
>exact same methods to achieve victory so the greener person can learn from
>the veteran. A young wizard would learn nothing from a quadding wizard given
>that the young wizard can't snare. A young cleric would learn nothing from a
>veteran cleric given the vet is using a method, CH healing, that the
>youngster cannot replicate. To use your warfare analogy, a guy with a rifle
>isn't going to learn how to be better with his rifle by watching the company
>machinegunner mow down enemies - nor will he learn by being on the deck of
>that battleship.

*shrug* Analogies are always suspect, but they can help get a point
across to a willing listener. I don't think the examples I've used
are particularly idiotic. I will, however, admit that using words
like "idiotic", "moronic" and "asinine" in my arguments probably
wasn't a very clever approach to seeking out willing listeners.
Next time I'll put the nicotine patch on at least an hour before
posting. 😛

You do touch on a key issue I was overlooking. The steep power
ramp-up throughout the levels in most level-based games tends to
make a mockery of the contributions of lower level characters in a
group. The idea I'm doing such a poor job of articulating probably
won't ever work very well in such a game.

Likewise, Lance reminds us of the generous level range allowed for
groups in EQ1, and that makes for an interesting example. There
are plenty of mobs that a level 60 can comfortably solo that would
quickly wipe a full group of level 45s, and yet that level 60 can
group for experience all the way down with level 40s. So, as Lance
points out, EQ1 apparently makes significant allowance for what I
was aiming at already. Unfortunately, it does so in a way that
that usually trivializes challenges for the lower level characters.

It may well be that there is no way to create the environment I'm
imagining in a game with a steep player power-up curve. Which, in
turn, may well mean that there is no chance in hell of ever seeing
it in a commercially viable game. But I'm not ready to abandon the
idea yet, I'm tired of endless repetition of the same-old, same-old
in the games we play and I can't shake the feeling that there is a
real opportunity to make things more interesting that can grow out
of this.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 02:19:45 GMT, "Wolfie" <dbgbdwolf@gte.net> wrote:

>kaev wrote:
>> On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 23:37:32 GMT, "Wolfie" <dbgbdwolf@gte.net> wrote:
>>
>>> kaev wrote:
>>>> I've long been bothered by the approach MMOGs (at least the ones I
>>>> have played) take regarding disparate level groups of PCs. It's
>>>> not only counter-intuitive, it's blatantly, even absurdly, counter
>>>> to the way people have taught one another since forever, both IRL
>>>> and in the stories they tell one another.
>>>
>>>> Restricting the pace of level/experience gain makes sense.
>>>
>>> And there it is. "Level" has nothing to do with "learning."
>>
>> Ah, the revelation. Guess I'll go back and snip everything above.
>> You not only buy into the idiocy, you willingly attempt to extend
>> it with a transparaently false statement. Thanks for trying, you
>> will probably do better next time if you ask somebody who has
>> already learned how to think coherently to give you a few pointers.
>
>Try looking up 'ad hominum' and come back when you can
>make some argument on the issues...

First, you're correct in objecting to the obvious insult in my
sarcasm. It was unnecessary, and more importantly ungracious.
I apologize and will try my best to discipline myself against
repeating the offence.

Second, you're not only incorrect but unintentionally ironic
in suggesting that I did not "make some argument on the issues."
There are exactly two ways to make truth out of your claim that:

'"Level" has nothing to do with "learning."'

One is to adopt a definition of learning that excludes
experience (let us not forget that "levels" are the product of
"experience" in the games under discussion, eh?). This would
not only contradict the existing meaning and usage of the word
"learn", it would make it profoundly useless. The alternative,
redefining the word "experience" to mean "quasi-magical coupons
you can cash in for cool power-ups!", is equally absurd.

I could be wrong, of course, but it seems to me that calling you
on advancing a statement that is plainly false as the crux of
your argument was much more important than responding in detail
to the snide little one-liners which you used to demonstrate your
incomprehension earlier.

Now, in the interest of fairness, I will admit that the games in
question mostly go with option two in the implied newspeak of
their implementations. Perhaps that accounts for your confusion.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 18:37:13 -0800, Dark Tyger
<darktiger@somewhere.net> wrote:

>On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 01:43:04 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
>wrote:
>
>>>[SNIP]
>>
>>(caveat: Parts of this post may read as insulting, even though this
>>is the fourth draft. Please, if you would, resist the urge to
>>interpret them that way, as it is not my intent to be insulting.)
>
>"I'm going to start off my reply with blatant spin-doctoring and
>mis-representation of an activity that's commonly viewed as common
>courtesy."

No. I said what I meant, and I meant what I said.


kaev
 
Archived from groups: alt.games.everquest (More info?)

On Thu, 30 Dec 2004 05:52:01 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
wrote:

>On Mon, 27 Dec 2004 18:37:13 -0800, Dark Tyger
><darktiger@somewhere.net> wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 28 Dec 2004 01:43:04 GMT, foreverspam@lamenames.net (kaev)
>>wrote:
>>
>>>>[SNIP]
>>>
>>>(caveat: Parts of this post may read as insulting, even though this
>>>is the fourth draft. Please, if you would, resist the urge to
>>>interpret them that way, as it is not my intent to be insulting.)
>>
>>"I'm going to start off my reply with blatant spin-doctoring and
>>mis-representation of an activity that's commonly viewed as common
>>courtesy."
>
>No. I said what I meant, and I meant what I said.

Wow. I don't know what I was on at the time of that post. Somehow I
had read the quote as a jab at my snipping most of the original post.
Aye yiy...

--
Dark Tyger

Sympathy for the retailer:
http://www.actsofgord.com/index.html
"Door's to your left" -Gord
(I have no association with this site. Just thought it was funny as hell)

Protect free speech: http://stopfcc.com/
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom