Hanover Fist

I voted no (how predictable is that? ). I took MM for one reason: to explore strange new maps, to seek out new monsters and new cities... well, you get the idea I like being able to go into seemingly dangerous places and having a reasonably good chance of getting out alive, without having to fight. MM is the closest thing EL offers to the character archetype that I like to play (sort of a sneaky, crafty, wood-wise type). If I want a "thrill," well, I'll reset and not take MM (or maybe I'll just streak through Kilaran Fields ) If you introduce some mechanism by which we explorer-wannabes could "dodge" monsters, one that doesn't rely on a laggy home key or frantic (and also laggy) mouse clicking, then I'd think otherwise. Better flee was already mentioned, as was some sort of "stealth" skill (applicable to monsters only). Another possibility might be to give the aggressive monsters some sort of regular patrol that changes slightly over time, so savvy players could scout monster movements and bolt when the time was right (inasmuch as we can bolt, that is). ...and why do some folks think "harder" or "realistic" are the same as "better gameplay?" <_<

Heh - I'm not an economist, but I no longer think that deflation in EL is about either money supply or overproduction. I think it's about newbie sellers who think it's "smart" or "competitive" to undercut the market. Anecdotal evidence: Someone whose name I've never seen on channel 3 will ask for a price check on, say, raw meat. A handful of people will quote around the same price. Minutes later, the newb will be selling meat for a 1/2 or 1 gc below the average response. Raw meat, steel shields, essences - I've seen 'em all bottom out because some new kids feel like they have to beat the market - and their prices will stick. (Yes, we've probably all been guilty of this...) There are also the regular buyers who jump on any price check with a substantially lower-than-market price. One guy who buys meat all the time priced meat at 3-5gc on ch3 - when it was selling regularly for 5-7gc. Similar effect; newbie sellers take that price at face, then try to beat it <_< Remember that EL is not the real world. What you learned in Econ 101 may not apply, and things happen in EL that you wouldn't learn about in Econ 101. There's a trick to selling on the EL market, and part of it involves not feeling like you have to sell your stuff right now

...I know no one's gonna like this, but here goes... It would be more "epic" if you did have to die to charge this thing - you'd be making a literal self-sacrifice to gain more power later. Afraid of losing the item in a db as soon as you make it? Well, either code it so that you can't lose it when you die... or make sure you charge the item in some secret, poorly travelled area. But I know anyone who reads this will scream bloody murder

Huh - this looks slick But I think you can be even simpler with calculations. Instead of your enemy granting a chunk of xp each time you make a successful attack, maybe it could grant a smaller amount of xp per point of damage you deal. No kill steals, no loss of attack xp for fighting with a weapon, and the xp could rack up while you're fighting. But I see two, maybe three problems: 1) If xp/damage has to be an integer (as opposed to floating point - no idea what the issues are here), the devs won't be able to fine-tune attack xp too well. For monsters, fine-tuning could happen through hit points (assuming higher level monster = more hp => effectively more xp), but don't know what to do for pvp. 2) Defense xp would suffer, IMHO, under both schemes proposed. Killing your enemy faster still means getting attacked less often. Like you said, you could merge a/d into a single skill. Another option might be this: When you get started in a fight, the server generates some number based on your max hp. Each time you get hit, though, this number drops by a certain amount (based on the difference between the monster's attack skill and your defense, maybe?). When the fight ends (you disengage, win, or die), the final number is what you get for def xp. I see big problems with this, but I'll let someone else play critic 3) You could still heal-train. That is, you could attack an enemy, and, if it's a guaranteed win, you or a buddy could "Heal Other" to keep the enemy in the fight, racking up xp in the process. Me, I don't see this as a huge problem - after all, you're putting extra effort into the fight, and if att xp is decreased by your skill (like it is now), you'll still have to face some reasonably tough fighting to be worth your time. Anyway, just throwing out some thoughts. I'm also bugged by being discouraged from training with a weapon...

Radon pouches are just another harvesting event; I've been hit harder with crashing walls, and I get much more annoyed from breaking pickaxes Besides, we've already got harvesting rewards: gc, xp (though both minor), serp stones, and rostogols. I'd like more variety in these rewards, but I don't think they should happen more often. Also, the idea of linking these positive rewards to negative events is cool (i.e., positives only happen simultaneously with negatives), but I don't see why radon pouches should be singled out.

Dude, chill I didn't like cooldown either, because I thought it was a kludge to fix something that I didn't see as a huge problem (i.e. overproduction). (And, yes, Roja, I know what Entropy told you, but I got two forum posts that say otherwise ) Turns out that's not what cooldown's about at all. My bad. From what I understand now, cooldown is the first of a set of features that (among other things) will help make fighting more strategic, and less of a "twitch game." I am not now, nor have I ever been, a PKer, so take the following with a grain of salt; but the old way of fighting was to engage your enemy, then rapid-click between the Restore spell and BRs until you won or had to click a dis ring (or died). With cooldown, you can't rely on the twitch anymore - you gotta pick your battles with more care, and it's less likely that any one single player will be able to dominate the field. Already more strategic, and more options are in the works. Summoners currently take a hit, and fighters may feel slighted, but the devs have already said that they're working on both activities. Meanwhile, producers have already found ways to deal with cooldown, and many are reporting faster production rates. I've buried my hatchet, and my faith in the devs has been restored - maybe cooldown's not as big an issue as you thought it was

Ahh, thank you Roja. I think I finally get the whole picture. If I may: "While cooldown was originally expected to play a role in curbing overproduction, the developers have decided instead to focus on using it to build a more strategic fighting system. In fact, cooldown's impact on production has been minimized as much as possible, and other methods of dealing with production problems are in development." Is that about right? If so, woohoo cooldown!

...or, maybe it's the only forum we have where we can ask you, Entropy, "Do you really think it's a good idea, and, if so, why?" You didn't even brook any conceptual criticisms with cooldown on the test server: http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.p...ndpost&p=224957 Don't mistake conservatism with any finger. Don't even mistake it for anti-progress. Some of us just aren't ready to jump on a wagon that's full of pretty toys without knowing where the wagon is going. (Heck, haven't even seen any toys yet, except those "toys" that fix the wagon.) ...why does this remind me of the whole Harriet Miers thing?

...I thought I knew the reasoning, based on the context in which this post was made: http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.p...ndpost&p=202880 Not to mention the wording of this post: http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.p...ndpost&p=216109 See, now you've got my positive attention. I knew you had some plans for introducing more strategic and tactical play, and I was looking forward to them (in addition to the new skill system, etc.). But, after searching with the keyword "cooldown," and "Entropy" as author, I haven't found where you describe cooldown as an integral, necessary part of a larger plan. All the posts I can find (apart from the above) describe what cooldown does, mechanistically, not what it's for. You'll do what you want, of course, and I'm not gonna ask to change my vote (it's still valid based on the information I currently have). I'll just wait for your full elucidation after the vote is ended. (Edited to remove a previous edit )

Sorry if this isn't an appropriate post, but I just got real confused. Roja, in your post in the "should cooldown stay?" thread, you state that cooldown wasn't intended to save the market. However, Entropy introduced the cooldown idea smack in the middle of a thread about a crafter's strike (http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.php?s=&showtopic=18519&view=findpost&p=202880). Said strike was taking place because the crafting market was ruined (according to the strikers - not being a crafter, I can't judge). Please answer bkc56's question, i.e., what is the purpose of cooldown? If not to help the market, then, as bkc56 pointed out, we really can't comment intelligently until we know why it was introduced.

I voted "no." 1) Cooldown didn't solve the problem it was supposed to solve (market surplus & deflated prices, which, IMHO, weren't really key problems); 2) There have been more "natural" and focused alternatives proposed; 3) Cooldown has unintended consequences - if it stays, the devs would have to "patch the patch" or ignore the complaints of fighters and summoners; 4) Yer not gonna get this mule to walk by waving a few carrots in my face :glare: Probably would never be able to afford any of those "special" items anyway. Don't get me wrong - I appreciate the time and effort the devs and mods put into this game. I just don't see how cooldown was supposed to work, or why it should stay. If that was too much "no" for someone's taste, I await my one-month ban -_-

...except that food cooldown has also hit non-manufacturers (esp. fighters and summoners), yes? And cooldown apparently hasn't hit manufacturers enough to make a difference... Maybe I'm mistaken, but I thought cooldown was intended to prevent market surplus. If this is incorrect, please explain. (edited to remove quoted stuff)

So I want to build on Cycloonx's idea a bit (see http://www.eternal-lands.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=21290 ). But a quick note first: The EL economy is not, and will never be, like the RL economy. EL is not, and never will be, the real world. No death; no capital; no property. Players don't do things in EL to make a living; they do things to have fun (even if "fun" often means running the levelling treadmill). Any attempt to simulate RL just for the sake of simulating RL is a mistake. Any attempt to analyze EL in RL terms is a mistake. RL may (and should, and does) serve as a source of inspiration for EL and other games, but it should never, ever, EVER be "the" model for EL or any other game. Anyway, that being said, I like Cycloonx's idea of having much longer times to manufacture items, without being stuck at the forge to do it. This could be handled in a similar way to how books are handled. You have a manufacturing window, separate from the current "mixing" window. You choose components from inventory, the same way you do in mixing. Then you click the Manufacture button. The components stay in your inventory, but are greyed out to show that they're not available for use, trade, or storage. Your character can then walk around and do other stuff. So how can you create, say, a sword while walking around? Well, the same way you can read up on the finer details of Stars Medallion construction while fighting for your very life The actual process of making the item is abstracted away from your clickety-click playing, and you can make up any rationale you want if you have a personal need to explain it (e.g. the time really represents work done when you're logged off; you have an apprentice who does the grunt-work; or, and here's a thought, it's just the way the game works!). Anyway, when the time is up, the virtual dice are rolled. If successful, you get a greenish book-like message saying saying the item is completed, your components are replaced by the item, and you get a big chunk of manu exp. Other details need to be worked out: Can you cancel the manufacturing, and, if so, do you recover all your components? Is manufacturing interrupted when you get killed? Can you lose greyed components when you get killed? Should experience be based on the item, or on the time you spent manufacturing it? What other effects on the market is this likely to have? Also, timing and the amount of food used would have to be tweaked a bit for good balance. If it works, this could also be extended to medallions and any other non-consumables that the Powers-that-Be decide to introduce. As far as consumables go (e.g., essences and rings), I'd leave them as they are, and let the market deal with deflation (which I might address in another thread - mass production does not seem to be responsible for the drop in consumables prices). And for those of you who think that mass production of big-ticket items for the sake of exp. doesn't really happen, and thus doesn't ruin the market for them, well, I disagree, but I'm not gonna argue. (I can't explain 400gc steel shields otherwise). However, this might be less immersion-breaking than, say, being able to make steel chainmail in under a minute (yes, immersion is a factor, even if RL isn't so much). Not saying this is a good or bad idea, or even a decent alternative to cooldown. Just offering this as a mechanism by which Cyc's idea could work. P.S., after some thought, I really don't like the idea of having intermediate items in the manufacture process. Seems like all that would do is introduce extra busy-work - I don't see it inspiring division of labor, an extra dimension of trade, or adding to gameplay in any meaningful way. P.P.S. Got other alternatives to cooldown? Post 'em here!

Nice (albeit lengthy) post, Chance. Just to follow up, I had a lvl 54 alchemist/manufacturer back when cooldown was first being, uh, "discussed" (i.e., when Entropy said he was going to implement it "just to hear you bitch"). I thought it was a bad enough idea that I dropped the game like plutonium (there was other stuff going on, but cooldown was the 50-lb weight that broke the camel's back). Deleted my char, said my goodbyes, and went to find another MMORPG. So why am I back? Cuz almost all of the MMORPGs I played just had one dimension - kill things, get their stuff, level up, and kill tougher things. Stuff like alchemy and manufacturing, if it existed at all, were poorly worked afterthoughts, not core to the game like in EL. And the one game that offered EL-like breadth took so freakin' long to level up in that it wasn't worth it (and otherwise had the feel of a cheap Russian knock-off of EL, topped off with mods who spoofed newbies for entertainment <_< ). Anyway, I still think cooldown is a hackneyed, ad-hoc, jerry-rigged, cure-the-symptom-not-the-disease, slap-a-bandaid-on-a-gaping-wound, no-child-left-behind approach to "balancing" the game (had to get my digs in somewhere). But who else remembers the degree of bitching going on before cooldown, about how market prices for everything from essences to serpent swords were going down the toilet? Who remembers the anemic attempts to form "manufacturers' strikes" and "alchemists' unions" that did nothing but make MrMind richer? So to my fellow bitchers, I say this - start thinking about why market prices continually drop, start thinking about why it takes so long to level up in some skills as opposed to others, and start thinking about stable, workable in-game solutions. Otherwise, you risk getting slapped with "fixes" that'll make you bitch even louder. Who knows? Maybe Entropy will even listen.

I have this problem too, but I'm not using the test client. Molgor and William are especially bad - often can't get a speak icon at all. Sometimes I get an attack icon instead (yep, I made sure I hadn't accidentally hit the attack button). Also had some problems getting a trade icon on other players (and them with me). Right-clicking to cycle through icons never works. Logging off and on doesn't always work (about 50/50). However, taking a step and trying again always fixes the problem (so far, at least). Also, recently did a storage trade at Grim's. Everything worked fine until we both hit Accept, then we got "Trade session failed. XXX can't carry all the items." (XXX = the other character). We were both almost on top of Grim, so proximity to storage wasn't the issue. We tried a few times, even stepping around a bit, then gave up and went to trade at VOTD (worked fine there). Don't know if that's related. Anyway, sorry to throw in an off-topic post; just wanted to let you know that this bug isn't exclusive to the test client.